


Eventide

by Lertsek



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Ancient China, Character Death at Old Age, Chinese Mythology & Folklore, Dragons, M/M, Multiple Religion & Lore Sources, NCT Ensemble - Freeform, Other Ships Not Mentioned in Tags, author took prompt and ran with it, couple of other idol cameos let's see if you can spot them, no beta even with a 50k fic we die like men
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-22
Updated: 2020-05-22
Packaged: 2021-03-03 04:22:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 57,476
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24288853
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lertsek/pseuds/Lertsek
Summary: There is an ancient Chinese myth about ten suns rising to the sky only to not set, scorching the earth and letting the monsters crawl out into the light. Somewhere along the years, the myth of the ten suns got twisted. In fact, there are only seven suns, and one archer, named Ten.
Relationships: Dong Si Cheng | WinWin/Chittaphon Leechaiyapornkul | Ten
Comments: 21
Kudos: 61
Collections: Weishen Fest: ANYTHING BUT HUMAN





	1. Definite Dusk

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Definite Dusk — when the sun reaches the Vale of Obscurity

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you weishenfest mods for every single extension you've given me so i can finish this beast  
> thank you to the people who stuck with me while i wrote it, without you it wouldn't have gotten finished  
> and thank you prompter for letting me run wild with this amazing idea, i hope you enjoy what i made of it
> 
> please read the tags
> 
> anyways here's prompt #ABH092

"I will cut off the dragon's feet, chew the dragon's flesh,

so that they can't turn back in the morning or lie down at night.

Left to themselves the old won't die; the young won't cry."

 _Suffering from the Shortness of Days_ by _Li He_

The beauty of the Miao fields is that a river runs through them. Which means Ten can spend more time hunting and less time being hunted. 

The Yangtae river separates the claimed land directly in half. Claimed land that is constantly trying to be pushed further south by the Miao tribes who own it. But even if all three tribes have united, they have been playing it slow. Retreating more often than that they rage on and attack. There is no cowardice in retreating, Ten knows this, has learned it over the many years he himself has spent playing this game on a smaller scale. There is especially no cowardice in retreating when on one side of your southern borders there are Viet tribes with their clever tricks and on the other side there are Barbarians who overpower you in brute force. Really, Ten does not blame the Miao tribes for their constant retreating at all. 

It’s funny, that the people of Ten’s own land would sooner shoot him than the people outside of it would. It’s not even like it’s a Northern versus Southern debate (even if that is still something that has not been settled throughout the ages), it’s more that the Southern tribes don’t know what Ten is. Which, for them, is an issue. You’d think it would also be an issue for the person in question, but Ten has long ago made peace with not knowing who his parents are. Or were—he does not know if they live. 

The Viet tribes have no issue with him fluttering around their borders like a bird who doesn’t know where to build its nest. Even if there is no official leader to hold all the tribes together, they know not to touch The Archer. Ten has always hated that name, sees himself as a man first and myth second (if he sees himself like that at all. It switches depending on the day, the hunt, if he gets the job done). 

The Barbarians are a little harder to please, but they share the same gods, which goes a long way. Even if Ten is iffy about the gods’ existence in the first place, he has had enough time pretending he is a full believer to make it convincible. Maybe in a different life, he could have been one of the people that plays a lire, instead of a bow loaden with arrows. Maybe in a different life, Ten would not spend his days with his brain full of war plans and strategy, but instead full of songs and voices that can take on a different pitch. 

Now though, he only has one voice in his mind. His own. And it’s telling him that he has to shoot three centimeters more to the west if he wants to hit his mark. 

The spider doesn’t go down with the first arrow, but Ten was prepared for that, had anticipated it. It’s a beast of a big caliber, but not the biggest he has ever taken on. The second arrow lands in one of its front legs and pins it to the ground. A third into the second back leg, rendering the beast unmoveable. The fourth goes through the head and the spider will not live to tell about that shot. 

He takes the arrows out in quick succession, ripping them out of the body one by one, trying to get them wrapped up in cloth before the venom leaks down the wood of them. Ten knows he would get a good scolding if the venom would seep into the wood. And quite frankly, he is too tired for another scolding session. 

He still has to make his way back to the border to let his commissioner know he cleared the mission, but not before taking a few samples of the venom with him. It’s now leaking freely out of the four spots where the spider was shot, proving that the beast is one big poison vessel. 

This is how she was described to him and yet Ten only believes it now that he has seen it with his own two eyes. Not that he would ever doubt his commissioner, no, it would be stupid to second guess someone’s information that has proven to be trustworthy for years, information from someone he considers _friend_ on the good days and _clever idiot_ on the others. 

Ten fills the three vials he had been given almost to the brim. Stopping only when he knows that if he takes more the cork that he has to plug the vials with will only cause sideway leaks. He can’t have that. Otherwise the normal scolding session will turn into a one-sided berating. Which is just embarrassing. For both parties. 

At least Ten thinks so, Hendery probably secretly likes chewing him out. The bastard. 

He places the vials in a plastic container, throws out the first dirty patches of cloth—that are soaked in the places where the tips of the arrows rested—and wraps the used arrows in a fresh layer, placing them besides the container in his bag. 

If someone asks, he’ll just say it’s food or, better yet, dirty clothes. Ten’d rather not have someone try and get him to share the _food._

* * *

Dejun might be the single most unimpressed person Ten knows. Unimpressed by the world, the people in it, Ten himself. Yet Dejun always knows how to give Ten a warm welcome, and this time is no different. 

“Unfortunately.” Is the return greeting Ten gets to his exclamation of _I am back in one piece!_

“I had hoped maybe this time you’d bitten off more than you could chew,” Dejun follows up with an exasperated sigh. “And yet.” 

“So you’re here standing at the ready with a horse because you thought I wouldn’t make it and you were definitely going to come search for me if you got worried.” 

It forms a funny picture, Dejun struggling under the early morning sun, a straw hat covering half his eyes and a plume of smoke drifting away from his mouth. 

“Would you shut up for a change.” Another sigh, another plume of smoke crawling up from under the hat. “I certainly haven’t missed your loud mouth.” 

Ten’s snort is instant. “There used to be a time you looked at me like I’d hung the sun, moon, sky _and_ the entire galaxy.” 

“Your god complex, too, is something I haven’t missed.” Ten can hear the stilled laugh in that sentence at the utter ridiculousness of the comeback. 

He puts on a pout. “And now you won’t even look at your god.” Ten plays up the pity look, widening his eyes when Dejun finally looks up. The boy having to push the straw hat back because it falls over his eyes again. Ten tries to hold back his laughter to keep the pout. It’s a losing battle. 

Dejun doesn’t react, just takes another drag of his cigarette and gives Ten his most unimpressed look. 

Ten sighs and drops the act. “Did you really think I’d walked into something I couldn’t handle?” 

“No,” Dejun says with a drawl, letting his southern accent come through.

With an abhorrent imitation of said accent, Ten says, “Just admit you missed me.” 

Dejun looks like he’d rather get ripped apart by coyotes. “Get on the fucking horse would you.” 

“I missed you too,” Ten says, striding forward and taking the hand his friend is holding out to help him swing himself onto the horse. 

“If I didn’t know it would take an entire army and then some to kill you I would have done it myself.” 

“Smokes?” 

Dejun pulls at the reins and turns the horse south. “Right pocket.” 

Before Ten can make a comment about the atrocious brand pick, Dejun cuts in, “One word and I swear to the gods I will throw you off this horse and trample you over.” 

Ten wisely does not say what he was about to, instead takes a cigarette and the lighter Dejun holds out to him over his shoulder. 

“You wouldn’t,” Ten says, knowing full well Dejun very much would.

“Trample you twice and a third time for good measure. Now hold on tight.” 

Ten does as he is told, because over the years he has found you better listen or pay the price when you don’t. Not that that keeps him and his big mouth from saying, just quietly when they take off, “I really can’t believe you’ve put yourself on Strikes.” 

He gets a kick to his shin for his efforts at trying to make Dejun see the better ways of tobacco. 

* * *

They smoke through almost the entire pack—not that it was very full to begin with—on their way to what Dejun calls home. It is wet, mostly, like the east usually is. Ten might be south of the invisible border that separates the Mainland from everything around it, but that doesn’t mean the land suddenly changes. East on this side is the same as east on his side. If he can even call it his side, when these days it feels like there isn’t really any side to fight on but his own. 

Allies are few and far between. In recent years, the motto has become kill first and look second, if at all. Threats are on all sides, not just south. While the west may look friendly, you never know what hides in the desert. While walking the sand dunes, humans are the least of your problems. It’s one of the reasons Hendery always opposes Ten taking missions from there, even if it saves them money for travel, and even if the Ba tribes on the western border are the most pleasant to deal with. 

There is a reason why the Ba tribes stick more to the south too. Why they risk their careless position and ease of being spotted by the Barbarian tribes in favor of going further north and facing what is there. There is a reason Ten and Hendery get more requests from across the western border than they do from anywhere else. 

While the west may have invisible dangers, the south has its very own unpleasantries. One of them being that you do not ride your own horse into a Viet tribe. You just do not. Being mistaken for a Mainland scout is the best that can happen to you. Remember, kill first and look second. 

Dejun’s home abides by the same rule, which is why even with his horse out of war gear, you would still be able to recognize it as a tribe horse. 

With only three more cigarettes left in the pack and half a day’s ride behind them, they stumble upon the town. It is planted down right in the middle of nowhere, which is how the founding story goes. One day a guy decided to build a village, he puts down a shovel and starts to dig. Ten is long happy the guy decided to do it here rather than further east, where the air gets saltier and the weather even wetter. He has never been a fan of water. 

They are let in without fanfare. Dejun is known here, known very well. Known so well that questioning him and his whereabouts would not be tolerated. And so they do not question why he rides into town with another man on the back of his horse, a bow tightly strapped to the man’s back. 

A cloud has followed them all the way as they rode, lingering behind, waiting for the right moment to let the water fall. It decides that the right time is exactly when Dejun is done putting his horse in her stable and lighting up another cigarette. 

“That means you have to cut down on your smoking,” Ten says, wrapping his own coat just a bit tighter around himself for the small walk back to where he knows Dejun’s apartment to be. 

Dejun puts his straw hat back on, this time not against the sun. “I don’t listen to hypocrites.” It makes him look young, the hat, the demeanor, the way he looks completely soaked through in less than three seconds. The way Dejun looks like he couldn’t care less about it. It makes him look young, yes, but also like he has grown. 

“How long has it been,” Ten asks when he’s taking off his shoes in the small hallway of Dejun’s apartment. The hallway might be small, just like the entire place in which Dejun lives, but the stuff that’s lying around certainly speaks of money. “Four, five months?” 

“Six, actually,” Dejun says back from the kitchen. “Tea?” 

“Please.” Ten takes off his coat, deciding against just throwing it over the couch and instead finding a chair to hang it over, some water dripping down onto the floor. As he looks around the place he can hear Dejun rummaging through the cupboards. 

Not much has changed apart from a new addition to the string instruments that line the walls. This instrument, though, is not one containing strings, instead the bottom of it bearing resemblance to a smoking pipe the old men all across the country can’t seem to go without. 

“I didn’t know you played the Sheng?” 

“I don’t.” Another cupboard is closed, this time with more aggression behind it. 

Ten laughs, already knowing where this is going. And yet he can’t help but ask, “Then why put it on your wall?” 

“Gift.” 

Ten walks over to the kitchen, careful to stay in the door opening and not put himself in the direct line of fire. His bow is still with his coat, and he can’t be sure he can take Dejun in hand to hand combat. “You stole someone’s heart?” 

“Don’t go spouting nonsense.” Dejun has found the leaves and carefully deposits them into two cups, adding a few more to one that Ten assumes will be his. Six months they haven’t seen each other, and yet Dejun still knows Ten likes his tea strong. 

“You’re not unlovable, you know.” Dejun doesn’t seem to care about the statement. The only reaction Ten gets is an eye roll. “I mean you might be grumpy and have a bad sense of humor but surely someone is willing to settle with that.” 

Ten can hear the water boiling inside the teapot. Dejun turns off the stove, filling the cups with the hot water in one swift motion. He does it just as deftly as he swings himself onto horses. Perks of living alone, Ten supposes, but then again Dejun always seems to do everything with practiced ease. There is only one person in the world besides Dejun that Ten knows is handier with horses and riding, and their personalities could not be more different. 

Dejun ushers Ten out of the kitchen by a sweep of his hand. “Sounds reassuring. Nice to know there is someone equally grumpy and bad humored who will settle with me.” 

Ten throws himself onto the couch, feeling slightly bad for still being in his soaked through pants, not that Dejun seems to care. He hands Ten his cup and leans back into the couch himself, the only thing dry on him being his hair.

“Opposites attract, you know.” The cup is hot in Ten’s hands, Dejun puts his own down to cool off, Ten doesn't. “And besides, they don’t need to be grumpy as well, they just need to be patient. And put up with your terrible smoking habit,” Ten says as an afterthought. 

“I know you’re not insulting the habit but the brand again.” Dejun pokes him with his socked foot. “Stop insulting Strikes they taste fine.” 

“I’ll stop if you tell me who gave you the present.” Ten takes a sip of the tea. The water is still scalding hot, he does his best to swallow. When he looks back up Dejun is grinning at him. Ten can read the look in his eyes. _Serves you right._ Ten can’t argue with the truth. 

“Counsel gave it to me,” Dejun says with a distant expression, like they are a group he is not a part of. 

Wanting and being are two separate things. Ten long since figured out wanting something bad enough does not make it actually happen. In Dejun’s case, wanting to distance himself from the higher-ups does not mean he actually can. And besides the counsel not letting him go, Dejun’s own mind doesn’t let him distance himself either. 

Ten had asked him about it when they first met and got drunk together—a memorable experience in every friendship Ten carries. Dejun’s answer had been plain and simple: _it could be better._ Why, exactly, Dejun’s mind kept telling him it was Dejun’s job to fix the system was a question Ten wasn’t given the answer to. 

Being friends meant watching Dejun struggle on the sidelines for years, being listened to before being discarded again when his opinions weren’t wanted anymore. The people didn’t exactly love him either, but they respected him, which was all Ten could wish for his friend. 

At least Dejun got paid handsomely for his discarded efforts. Paid in the league Ten and Hendery used to dream about before their business got more known. 

“They don’t know what instruments you actually play, do they?” Ten guesses. 

“They think it all the same. To them, music is music, which I guess isn’t exactly wrong,” Dejun responds, grabbing his cup off the table and chancing a sip of his own. It seems to go over better than Ten’s try. “But it’s not exactly right either.” 

“You could sell it,” Ten proposes. 

Dejun shrugs. “It’s a good quality instrument.” He nods to the wall. “And besides, it’s the best looking one out of all of them,” he argues with a grin. 

Which is true, the untouched Sheng sticks out like a sore thumb between all the beaten up string instruments surrounding it. Especially next to the Liuqin which looks especially well loved.

“Sure looks clean.” Ten knows for all that Dejun hates the counsel and their idiotic gifts, he takes good care of his stuff. “You could get a good price for it.” 

Dejun shifts in his seat, averting his gaze to a corner of the room. “I’m waiting for the market value to go up,” he admits quietly. 

Ten’s laughter is instantaneous. “You sneaky bastard! I thought you didn’t care about money.”

“True, but that doesn’t mean I’m not going to get my full worth out of it.” Dejun takes another sip of his tea, a self satisfied sparkle in his eyes.

* * *

Dejun rides him all the way back, because he’s nice like that. Ten argues that it’s not necessary but Dejun is quick to add it to the payment list for a job well done. The Viet counsel is long happy to have a pressing threat eliminated from its borders, giving them room to search for paths to maneuver themselves into the Mainland from another side instead of just head on. 

Ten doesn’t much care for the potential opening he has just created. He and Hendery have talked about it, that besides danger there are other factors that might make them not want to take on a mission. They have their ethics that have been thrown out the window the day they started this business, and then they have their ethics that will last a lifetime. Boundaries they don’t cross. 

There are things Ten has done that he isn’t proud of. One instance in particular that haunts his already warped dreams. Between touches of galaxies and pictures of a scorching sun that are too vivid not to be real, there runs a girl, dressed in white, eyes that wouldn’t look human even if they weren’t hollowed out, a hole piercing through her vocal cords. Sometimes the hole bleeds, sometimes it doesn’t. Ten is long happy they don’t work anymore, the vocal cords, long happy he can’t hear her singing in his dreams, or begging not to shoot. 

He hadn’t taken the money, instead had taken the body and given it a proper burial that the villagers refused to give in fear of the so-called curse spreading. Ten couldn’t exactly blame them, not with the graveyard the girl herself had left in her wake. 

No more shooting kids—no matter how inhuman their eyes are, how deadly their voices, how rotten their breath—doesn’t mean Ten can’t take on a job that might lead to the Outlanders having an upper hand over the Mainlanders. 

Again, him and Hendery had talked about it. Coming to the fast conclusion that while it may look like an opening for a full front war, actually crossing the border with a full army is easier said than done. What’s even harder is staying past it. A venomous spider is not the only threat that hides in those woods, the fields behind them being even worse. 

The journey back goes by almost without a hitch. They stake out for the night a couple miles before the Yangtae river. The horse needs its rest, having to run at full speed to the next river once they cross this one at day break. Once they will be past the Hanshui river they will be mostly safe, it’s the land between that will make or break their journey back. Or rather, the people that are camping out in the fields will decide if they live or die. 

It goes by almost without a hitch, but not completely. 

At the start of the second leg of their journey, the first arrow is fired. It does not come from Ten’s bow. The ambush drives them further back and towards the western border, Dejun cursing out Ten and his empty brain that made the decision to pound a home into the ground somewhere in the middle of fucking nowhere instead of in the nice fishervillages they have in the east. 

Ten argues that he wouldn’t be able to stand the rain and besides, Hendery was the one who had the final say in their home and the placement of it, seeing as he is the one who has to spend the most time there. 

Dejun’s only words to that are, “Well fuck him too,” before going on another tangent about how, exactly, he will chop Ten into pieces just for the sheer effort this is taking and, _there will be a pay reduction._

Ten doesn’t argue. If Dejun was really worried he wouldn’t be running his mouth a mile a minute. The group that is following them is disorganized, half of them not even on horses, already left behind in the dust. 

They follow the push west with the Yangtae river never too far away from their left flank. They can’t afford to steer themselves north and ride straight through the Miao lands, crossing the river isn’t an option either. Rather safe than sorry after all. 

In the end the couple of Miao riders that were still tailing them give up and turn around to make it back before sundown. Ten supposes it’s a tactical retreat, he is long happy the horse can finally get some rest. Because she sure needs it, carrying two fully grown men at high speed is taxing no matter how well trained. 

They stick to following the Yangtae river and make camp when they find some cover for the night. It’s not much, a couple of throwaway rocks mostly, but it serves its purpose. 

The ambush mostly costs them time, now having to ride all the way out to the western border in terms of safety. They can’t go back and they can’t go straight ahead, another ambush surely lying in wait. The alternate route adds another day to their already lost time. And while Dejun might be grumpy about it, Ten supposes there are worse people to have to spend time with. 

They don’t encounter any of the Ba tribes once they do start going north along the western border. Strangely, it saddens Ten, there is a rider he would have loved to introduce Dejun to. Someone who is not only the best horse trader Ten knows, but also the best sand lion rider. He would have loved to see Dejun try that out. But there is always another day, another time, they’ll have to schedule something once they are back in known territory. 

Dejun’s smokes run out just as they cross the Hanshui river. There is a lot Ten would do for his friend, and there is a lot Dejun will do in return, but riding without smokes is not one of them. Luckily the closest village is en route to their end destination. 

Hearing Dejun respond to someone that isn’t from the south always makes Ten realize just how pronounced Dejun’s accent actually is when he has to talk unannounced. It comes out easily when he’s flustered, even thicker when he’s straight up embarrassed—the heavy accent usually embarrassing him even further. 

The woman selling him three packs of Strikes is kind enough not to laugh at Dejun’s red turned ears. She’s kind enough to let him go with a quick _thank you_ instead of inquiring further about where it is they are coming from. Probably thinks he’s just a shy southerner with an old family line.

Dejun is quick in a fight, quicker in his thought process and strategy, but he has never been a quick liar. Whenever they have travelled together that role has always been reserved for Ten. Fluttering eyelashes and redirecting the conversation are two things Ten is good at besides getting a clean headshot even when the wind is against the course of an arrow. 

Ten swoops in neatly, tells the woman they got lost on their way to Fuxi, took a wrong turn because his friend was all too sure they had to take that left. And now they find themselves in this small town and isn’t that a pleasant coincidence. 

She laughs, doesn’t think twice about it, probably because Dejun went outside to avoid attracting more attention. They can’t exactly tell her they come from beyond the Mainland, not while they are still this close to the Miao border, it would be akin to ritual suicide. The woman might not care but she’d tell her husband about her boring day and maybe slip in that she met two men not from here. Or she’d boast to her friends about having met two Outlanders. And that husband or those friends would tell someone else. And sooner rather than later a group of Miao riders will stand over their beds and cut their throats in their sleep. 

In instances like these Ten really does wish he and Hendery made a home in the east, where secrets are kept and people don’t even blink or look twice. 

The woman, Yeri, Ten has learned is her name, even goes on to explain what exactly the fastest route to Fuxi is. Ten pretends to listen but tunes out during most of it, instead trying to see if he can spot Dejun through the windows. He could probably lead them from here to Fuxi blindfolded. 

Ten tunes back in when Yeri asks if they need a recommendation for a place to stay the night. He doesn’t just want to turn her down, she’s only offering more of her kindness, so he says sure. Yeri sends him on his way with a row of instructions towards an inn a little walk from the store and too much information about the owners that outsiders really couldn’t care less about. It does prove that people in this town not only talk but also love to run their mouths. 

If the constant threat of Miao riders wasn’t already enough of a reason to keep on riding and getting as far away from the border as they can, the fact that this town is not a quiet one is. 

When Ten meets back up with Dejun where they left the horse it seems the other has run another supply run besides just getting cigarettes. 

“Your arrows take up a lot of space,” Dejun grunts, securing another strap. “Probably should have left them with the bow.” 

“I did, the box with the vials that contain poison is what’s taking up the space.” 

Dejun stops his losing fight of trying to get the strap to stay put, just for a second. “You’re kidding.” 

“Hendery said to take samples.” 

“I bet he did,” Dejun scoffs. He leaves the once again unsprung strap hanging. “Goddamn.” 

“Leave the strap, I’ll hold it in place until we’re out of here then we can rearrange everything.” 

Dejun looks around before pointing his gaze back at Ten. “The people creeping you out too?” There is something in his eyes, Ten can tell. It’s not fear. Dejun isn’t afraid. He’s calculating.

“The town itself more than the people if I’m honest,” Ten says.

Dejun nods once, curt. “Let’s go.” 

He is kind enough to bring Ten back to his home safely on horseback. But that also entails that Dejun has to ride back to his own home by himself. He isn’t afraid. He’s calculating if he has any chance going back this way or if he has to make the long trek east and then bend southwards. 

“Let’s.” 

They walk, slowly, all the way out of town and then all the way back to where they hid their weapons. Neither Dejun’s sword nor Ten’s bow and actual arrow case moved. Risking going into the town already took a lot, they couldn’t risk actually entering while armed. Especially not with a bow the size of Ten’s. It would draw even more attention than they already had. Now they would just pass as normal travellers, who knows what would have happened if they had come in strapped to the brim. Yeri probably wouldn’t have been so friendly. They probably wouldn’t have even been let into town in the first place, not without force they weren’t planning on using. 

They ride around the town with a wide breadth. It’s only an hour until nightfall. But unlike in the Miao lands, Ten feels comfortable riding here after dark. He knows the routes here, knows the paths and the creeks and where the water is drinkable. 

They set a good pace and continue it deep into the night. Stopping only when Ten feels Dejun’s hands struggling to keep a good grip on Ten’s waist, the sleepiness making them slip every few minutes while Dejun tries to keep himself awake. 

Ten makes sure they cross the final river before he calls it quits. Dejun almost falls off the horse once Ten does let her stop. Instead of immediately turning in like Dejun, Ten lets himself enjoy the night sky a little longer. It almost doesn’t get any prettier. Almost. Ten has heard of the clean shot you have of the sky all the way up north, where the mountains rise as far as up to heaven and are covered with snow. There are stories, old ones, that tell of people using the mountain passes as gateways to visit deceased loved ones, none of them coming back afterwards. Ten always tries to see it for what it’s supposed to be, a heartwarming story with a sad undertone. But his brain always supplies the fact that the widows probably got lost and froze to death. 

There will always be a preference Ten harbors for riding in this region. Mostly for that meandering road that leads up to a cabin out of which always comes a plume of smoke, another building built next to it out of bricks where sparks fly around your ears day and night. 

No matter how much they bicker, no matter how much Ten feels that steady pump of having to move after staying in the cabin for a week, no matter how lonely it sometimes gets in a place where you hide in plain sight, once he can make out the first shape of his house there will always be that lul in his stomach. After all, there is nothing like coming home. 

Even if he prefers the sun by a landslide, he lets the moon soak him up while he strokes through the mane of the horse, just for a little while. 

* * *

Hendery is awkward in a lot of situations. He’s the person in a group to laugh at the wrong moment, the one who always feels like an outsider and yet never seems bothered by it. His heritage didn’t make it easy for him to make friends, and despite his admirable sense of humor, his personality didn’t either. 

Too _other_ is something Hendery heard a lot when he was still walking around palaces. Ten heard the whispers of the maids and the guests when he visited, the questions they asked in hushed whispers to one another, _are you really sure the Huang boy isn’t a bastard?_

The elite were probably happy to see Hendery fuck off, but the most happy one out of all of them to be gone was Hendery himself. His leave could better be described as a self imposed exile. It’s always speculated that Ten took Hendery under his wing, while the reality of it is that Hendery took Ten with him and gave him something steadfast to return to. 

Hendery is awkward in a lot of situations, but out here he flourishes. This is his domain, his home, a place he rules with heart and soul. 

Not even Dejun’s added presence can mess that up, no matter how weird the two have always been with one another when in the same vicinity. 

“Hello,” Hendery says, addressing Dejun with a quick nod and nothing more before enveloping Ten in a big hug. He gets a couple pats on his shoulder, one for each added day that he stayed away longer than calculated. 

Ten can feel Dejun adjust his posture, squaring his feet and straightening his back. He almost laughs into the crook of Hendery’s neck. 

“Poison?” Hendery asks when pulling away. Ten can almost imagine a tongue running over his lips in anticipation of a new toy. 

“Pocket of which the strap doesn’t close,” Ten says, Hendery already approaching the horse halfway through the sentence. “Be careful with the arrows,” he adds. 

“How many did you ruin,” Hendery asks. Excitement not letting him do a boring task like count how many arrows are soaked with poison. Ten counts it as a win for now, a delayed scolding always is. 

Ten considers lying but ends up saying, “Four.”

“Big beast huh.” 

“You could fit into it a couple of times.” 

“Good thing I’m a thin guy.” 

Ten hears a loud snort coming from his left. Hendery looks up from the vials filled with a purple poison at the sound. 

At the sight of Hendery’s eyebrow raising Ten can already feel where this is going. They might not come into contact with one another often but when they do it’s always the same sexually charged bitterness. You could use it as cement, that's how thick it is.

“Something to say, stick on legs?” 

“Shut up, Guanheng.” 

“Always the thoughtful comeback from you Xiaojun.” 

Ten sighs, loudly, hoping to snap them out of it. It never works. 

“If you guys are going to do your act can you at least do it inside.” They don’t even seem to feel called out. Truly, they are too comfortable around Ten. “I’m not gonna ask a second time.” 

Hendery passes by him, clutching the box with vials to his chest. “Home one second and already ordering the household around,” he mutters under his breath, continuing louder, “Yes my hero I will put on the kettle.” 

Ten rolls his eyes. Home sweet home. 

“Are you sure your royal hands know how?” Dejun asks. 

If anyone besides Dejun would’ve said that sentence Ten knows a rigid line would’ve appeared between Hendery’s shoulder blades. But with Dejun, Hendery just ignores him and instead asks Ten in a tone feigning boredom, “Why did you bring him?” 

“He kind of brought himself.” 

Hendery tsks, continuing his retreat into the cabin. “Next time you push him off the horse you hear me,” he throws over his shoulder. 

“I wouldn’t say anything,” Ten whispers to Dejun who was already readying a retort. “He might poison the tea.” 

“Lunatic.” 

“Oh the pot’s calling the kettle black.” 

“Shut up.”

“He is right, Dejun, you do have weak comebacks.”

* * *

It’s funny how Hendery can bend tiger bones to his will and create a swift bow that’s easy to carry, how he can skin dragon tendons and sharpen them into piercing arrows, how he can calculate the exact dose of poison a human needs to become imobile and not die. When Hendery puts his mind to something, he is like an unstoppable one manned force. Both the captain and the squadron. Tea, however, does not fall under any of the categories Hendery deems worthy. Because, quite frankly, the tea tastes like shit. 

The leaves are soaked maybe less than a minute because with things like this Hendery is impatient. It takes one sip and an inward battle of which Ten can follow the entire process for Dejun to stand up and take matters into his own hands. 

Hendery doesn’t even seem bothered by the fact Dejun picks the almost untouched cups off of the table and returns to the kitchen to fix up something that’s drinkable and not literally just hot water in a cup. Dejun is a familiar, someone they would invite to celebrations if they hosted them. And apparently Dejun is finally acting like one too, finally feeling free enough to use the knowledge he has of the house to act like he himself lives in it. 

“Only took him literal years,” Ten says. 

Hendery nods, eyes on Dejun’s form that immediately picks out the right drawer where the tea leaves are kept. “That, and some bad tea.” 

“You’re terrible,” Ten says with a laugh. “You know that.” 

Hendery doesn’t respond, just returns the statement with a knowing smile. He leans back in his chair, asks if Dejun’s place is still looking like it belongs to a neat freak before switching over to questions about the journey back. 

“Encountered some of the Ba tribe on the way?” Ten gets an instant feeling Hendery is not just asking because he hopes Yukhei sends his regards. 

“No, Miao, why?” 

“You missed the mail,” Hendery says, side eyeing Dejun who is still in the kitchen staring patiently at the leaves soaking in the cups. 

Even if Ten trusts Dejun with his life, and even if Dejun knows when and to whom Ten lost his virginity, or about that time he spent in captivity for a month living in his own shit, there are some things you just do not share. Like the name of your informant. Especially if said informant is a deserted Miao rider. 

Ten, with luck on his side, might get taken into questioning first if the Miao tribes catch him, Taeyong will not receive that same treatment. He is a shoot on sight case. A leave dead in a ditch case. A person who gets paid heavily to roam the east and send hawks about his findings or commissions from people who want to request Ten’s services case. 

Dejun carefully walks back to the living room and puts the newly brewed tea down on the table. Hendery pushes out a sincere, “Thank you.”

“Mail seems like a stable concept does it not?” Dejun asks the room, knowing he is missing something because Dejun has always been clever like that. Has probably already figured out that mail is not a letter but rather a person. “But then again nothing about you two is ever conventional, why would your mail be.”

Even if it's his own decision, you could say Taeyong gets paid a hefty sum to stay away from Miao territory, and by extension also from Ten. It’s the reason they never took what they had further, both of them not able to do long distance. Informants are more useful alive than dead after all. Though that doesn’t mean Ten can’t coincidentally stop by Taeyong when he is already fulfilling a commision in that region.

Dejun is right, mail is a stable concept. And Hendery would not have worded it that way if Taeyong himself hadn’t shown up at their very own doorstep. 

“The fucking idiot,” Ten says. It’s not like it surprises him, Ten knew from their very first encounter that Taeyong is nothing but a thick skulled bastard filled head to toe with a badly controlled deathwish. That’s why the east is good for him—and probably why Taeyong went there instead of north—they don’t ask questions about weird behaviour in the east. 

Hendery is looking back at him with the same resigned expression. You simply do not tame Lee Taeyong, even trying to never ends well. They have long since given up trying to get him to behave like a normal civilian. Another reason why it's good Taeyong keeps east.

“The idiot did have a reason,” Hendery says. 

“It better be a fucking good one.” 

Dejun is looking between them, making no indication to sit back down. He reaches for the pocket where he keeps his smokes. “I can leave the room if you want.” 

Hendery doesn’t answer. He waits. Looks at Ten with eyes that say _your call._

And it _is_ Ten’s call. Ten is the one who brought Dejun into the house after all. It means he vouches for him as a friend. They don’t just let anyone into their home, let alone leading them to it in the first place. 

They have suppliers who sometimes stop by, craftsmen and women who are trusted by the people in Hendery’s circle. They let them into the house and offer them drinks—Hendery was raised with good manners after all—but they don’t openly talk with them about why the hell a deserted Miao rider dropped by. 

They can still back out now, let Dejun go outside to discuss further or hold off on the topic and bring it up later tonight when the sun has set. Instead of doing either of those things, Ten says, “Our informant from the east has taken matters into his own hands and decided to go on a vacation.” He aims for a laugh and it works, both on Hendery and Dejun, the latter of whom has dropped back onto the couch.

“And he has decided that your rusty ass cabin is the perfect destination?” Dejun asks. “He sure is an idiot then.” 

Ten rolls his eyes. “It looks fine.” 

Dejun looks at him like he has grown three heads. Which would long not be the weirdest thing he has ever seen. “I was being nice. It looks like a tornado passed through.” 

Hendery shrugs. “I was in the fortress,” he gives as explanation. 

“The fortress being the stone get up next to this monstrosity?” 

Hendery nods, proudly, “The one and only. One more insult about my house and I will feed you to your own horse,” he adds with the same joy before turning back to Ten. “Unfortunately, the idiot didn’t just come by to say hello. Something is happening in the east.” 

“Then why didn’t he stay east?” Ten asks, more out of confusion than anger. 

“There’s word the same thing is happening in the west. But it’s worse there.” 

“War on the water in the east?” Dejun questions. “Maybe just the desert acting up in the west?” It sounds like he himself isn’t convinced either. 

“Our informant says it’s not just the men that sail on the water, the waves themselves, too, are unsure.”

“What does that mean? That the waves are unsure?” Dejun has always been a man of hard facts. He won’t listen to a sign of nature until it literally comes crashing down on him. There will need to be a tsunami for Dejun to see an omen for what it is. 

Not that this is an omen, at least not yet. 

“What’s he hoping to find in the west?” Ten asks. 

“Hoping? Nothing,” Hendery says, taking a sip from his tea. “Expecting? He said he doesn’t know.” 

“I don’t like it.” 

“I know, that’s why I said if he goes too far you’ll personally come cut his balls off.” 

“If he goes too far he should be glad to still have balls,” Dejun helpfully points out. He might be a sceptic, but even Dejun knows to stay away from the desert. 

Ten shares a look with Hendery. Taeyong has always been attracted to danger, but he also knows when to keep away to save his own skin. Him traveling from coast to landcoast doesn’t forebode well. Something must be really off to get Lee Taeyong out of hiding. 

It almost frightens Ten, but fear is not something that seizes him anymore, not during daytime at least, not while he is conscious. It couldn’t be in his line of work. Nights, though, are hard. There is a reason people say your own imagination is often worse than reality. When you’re asleep you can’t just close your eyes against what you see. 

Hendery’s imagination is just as big as Ten’s, he’s already speculating what might be throwing a fit in the desert. Dejun hanging onto his every word with an apprehensive smile but fond eyes. 

“Maybe it’s sand snakes again? Maybe they’re done roaming around in the sand and are trying to go east to get a bath? Maybe one of them succeeded? Or what about trolls! Oh no wait those are north. Maybe it’s the birds? Birds are always a pain in the ass.” 

“You think birds are what are making sailors restless?” Dejun asks, eyes shining with laughter. “Exactly what kind of education did you get in that palace?” 

“One that didn’t consist of just robbery and thievery much like yours.” 

“I’m not a thief,” Dejun counters. 

“He’s right. He risked our entire journey back just to score another pack of cigarettes but hey at least he paid for them.” Both Dejun and Hendery look at him like they can’t believe he has picked the opponents’ side. Ten is long happy another conflict has been avoided. “You can smoke inside if it keeps you from insulting the house and the people in it,” he tells Dejun. 

Ten tries the tea while Hendery looks for matches. Maybe if they ask him nicely Dejun will help fix up a meal that will be leagues better than what they usually eat. Cooking is another one of the skills Hendery does not deem worth his time, and neither does Ten, he spends too much time on the road with limited resources for it to have any use. 

Hendery retakes his seat and pushes a pack of matches into Dejun’s direction. When he ashes into his tea cup, Hendery’s lip curls up in disgust. He turns to Ten with a smile Ten knows all too well. 

“How many arrows did you ruin again, Ten?”

“Just four. I’m fine, by the way.” 

“I wouldn’t trust you if you weren’t.” 

“You know besides your mutual pining and complete disregard for society another thing you guys have in common is your failure in pretending you don’t care about my wellbeing.” 

“I only care because I’d rather have someone else do my dirty work,” Dejun says. Lies clouding the entire statement. To Ten’s horror, instead of Hendery digging into it and dragging Dejun through the mud again, he nods in full understanding. 

“I only keep him around to share rent with,” he tells Dejun, voice laced with agony. 

Dejun reaches forward with a sympathetic face and pats Hendery’s hand in silent support. 

Ten can’t help but be flabbergasted at the display of betrayal before him. But he recovers quickly. “Hendery, we don’t even pay rent.” 

Dejun’s hand flies back to his own space at the speed of light. “Of course the emperor’s son doesn’t have to pay rent like the normal commoners.” 

“I can’t help you haven’t worked yourself up the ranks to a noble non rent paying position,” Dejun snarls back. 

“Excuse me for not kissing your feet as soon as I stepped foot into your domain, do you want me to still get on my knees?” 

Ten slips out of the room, fearful Hendery will take Dejun up on that offer sooner rather than later. 

* * *

Minki is a sweetheart. She is a sturdy mere, born and bred for cavalry attacks. A warhorse through and through. If the Viet tribes ever succeed in crossing borders into the Mainland, Dejun will probably ride off with her into war. For now, she indulges in running around the open space around the cabin, sometimes slipping into the woods and returning exhausted by nightfall. 

She’s a sceptic like Dejun, but unafraid. She lets Hendery stroke her nose and leans in when Ten brushes her mane. 

“I pay to sustain her and yet she likes you more,” Dejun says, watching as she lets Ten scrape her hoofs without any protest. 

Hendery laughs. “Prime example of money not being able to buy love.” 

They rode Ten home on one horse for practicality. Dejun’s return journey would be much easier if he only had to look out for himself and one horse. Riding with an extra one back home through Miao territory would have been a dumb attempt. But in hindsight, it wouldn’t have mattered. Dejun sticks around for a week which turns into two. He sends a hawk at the beginning of the third week with a note to his council that he will stay longer to investigate a problem in the west that might help them get the upper hand over the Mainland if the emperor decides to redirect his attention to another problem. 

In reality, Dejun learns Hendery how to cut radishes properly and for how long to boil potatoes to make them more than just _edible_. He pretends to sleep on the couch for two weeks until Ten comes up to him one night and tells him that he doesn’t have to keep up the pretense. Ten thinks it’s funny his bluntness causes Dejun to become a blushing mess that tries to reassure him that _really, nothing is going on between us._ Ten finds it even funnier when Dejun exits Hendery’s room the next morning, using the sleeves of one of Hendery’s shirts to rub away the sleep from his eyes. The sheets that they would usually throw over the couch each night stay in the closet. 

Finally, after years, Ten has a shopping partner. Hendery has always refused to come with him, and for good reason, Ten wouldn’t want to walk amongst the people that basically casted him out of his home either. Even if said people weren’t the direct cause, their silence when a new emperor took reign had said more than enough. Ten knows their opinions don’t bother Hendery, but Ten also knows there is a hint of shame that courses through Hendery’s veins, picking up every time Hendery is reminded of what he left behind when he walked away from those palace walls and didn’t look back. 

Ten himself doesn’t like going out to the markets either—even without a bow he is too easily recognizable—but their suppliers don’t come often enough for him and Hendery to sustain themselves on what kind of food they could bring with them, especially not now that there is a third mouth to feed. 

It took a bit of convincing for Dejun to actually come along, but in the end Ten had won him over with the argument that Dejun would be in charge of the entire food list. 

When Dejun argues that he would also like a disguise if he is to go out, Hendery says, “They can’t hurt you here. Just stare nastily.” And it’s true, the Viet tribes might be invading the Mainlands’ borders and trying to push for war, but as long as neither side has made the official declaration, no one is legally allowed to hurt Dejun. No one except the Miao tribes, who don’t listen to rules from the palace, but are instead paid to do its bidding either way, which makes them all the more dangerous. 

In the end, Dejun does get his disguise, better safe than sorry after all. Ten is long happy he has someone to accompany him on the long walk, someone to show the land to. It reminds Ten of the early years during which he and Dejun would sneak past the border and head east to see the sea. Years during which Ten did not yet feel unease regarding water but instead embraced the cling of salt the air had to it. Years during which Dejun would still let Ten manhandle him into the right stance to shoot a bow. 

Throughout the years things may have changed—Dejun wields a sword now, and Ten has slept through many nightmares that leave the taste of salt in his nostrils and the back of his throat—but their friendship has always been a constant. It has evolved, sure, because people evolve and grow, they’re just lucky their friendship grew the right way along with them: closer. 

The days are easy, for a change. Dejun’s return journey gets postponed another week but it's only a matter of time before Taeyong will return, Ten can feel it in his guts. They’ve decided to venture back with him to the east. Taeyong won’t stay with him and Hendery, Ten knows that, he needs lands to roam, streets to walk down bustling with people, needs to garner life and breathe it in, and Taeyong cannot do that with solitude. The need to keep moving is something they both share. That’s why it’s an easy decision for Ten to make to come along with Dejun when the time comes. He’ll take any halfhearted mission to get himself out into the world again. 

Two days before Hendery’s scheduled supply drop, Ten’s wish gets granted. 


	2. Suspended Chariot

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Suspended Chariot — when the sun reaches the Fountain of Grief, it halts

The months have made a difference. Instead of red or dark brown Taeyong has grown his hair back to its original black. It makes him look younger, his face more rounded, even after the journey he just came back from—one that isn’t over yet. Both his eyebrows are fully grown and it takes a moment for Ten to stop searching for the usual eyebrow slit in the right one. The piercings in his ears, too, are gone. Ten almost doesn’t recognize him, but that upturn of a lip only belongs to one person. 

Taeyong’s stubble scratches past the side of his face as he envelops Ten into a hug. 

“You need to shave,” Ten says. He gets a kiss to his nose for the remark. It’s so familiar, just like Taeyong’s bodyline as Ten draws him back into his arms one more time. “Shave or no kisses.” 

That comment, too, is familiar. And Taeyong gives the expected response, he laughs. A sharp sound with a bite to it. “Ofcourse.” 

From up close, Ten can see there is sand stuck in Taeyong’s hair and under his nails. It makes him pause, he tries his best not to stiffen but draws back anyway. The smell of the desert now no longer hidden. 

“My mother’s name,” he asks, “what is it?” 

Understanding seems to dawn on Taeyong immediately and without hesitation he responds, “Mother.” 

Ten draws him back again, inhales, lets the doubt go and replaces it with a feeling of being content. 

“Did I pass,” Taeyong whispers into Ten’s hair, his lips not afraid to search for scalp to press onto. 

Ten nods lazily. “You always do.” A fake wouldn’t have known the answer to that question, simply because Ten doesn’t either, not the real one anyway. 

“We have a guest,” Ten says as he disentangles himself. “He is harmless and I trust him with my life, but...” Ten doesn’t have to finish his sentence, he doesn’t have to say Taeyong prefers not being known. 

“He knows I’m your informant,” Taeyong states. Ten nods again. Taeyong tilts his head slightly in thoughtful consideration. “Who is he?” 

To Ten’s surprise, Taeyong only has to hear Dejun’s name to agree to share his identity. 

“You’ve told me about him,” Taeyong gives as explanation once they’re both inside and Dejun has been allowed out of the hideout that was Hendery’s room. “Quite a lot.” He smiles and it's laced with trust, even after all these years. It reminds Ten of how far they have come since their first encounter. Sometimes he can still feel the chill of steel against the side of his neck, but instead of a shiver, the memory brings with a laugh. 

“Only good things I hope,” Dejun says, shooting Ten a glance with no heat behind it.

Taeyong’s eyes crinkle in amusement. “Something like that.” The glance Dejun shoots Ten this time does hold heat, quite a lot of it. “Don’t worry, I can appreciate any person that can keep up with Ten and his antics,” Taeyong reassures. 

“Good thing I’m always dumb in the stories but never dumber,” Dejun says, startling a laugh out of both Hendery and Taeyong. 

“I like him,” Taeyong whispers into Ten’s ear once they settle in the living room. He foregoes a shave to share a drink with them first, something stronger than tea. “He reminds me of you.” 

“Just more southern,” Ten jokes. He can see what Taeyong means, can agree with it too. 

Taeyong’s laughter is delightful. “You always fit better north than south.” 

“Are you kidding,” Hendery cuts in, “Ten wouldn’t survive a week up true north, he wasn’t made for the cold.” 

Ten rolls his eyes. “None of us were.” 

“Where do you fit?” Dejun asks Taeyong, curious. 

Taeyong shrugs, takes a sip from his drink and hums appreciatively as he mulls the question over. In the end, he says, “Wherever they tolerate me I guess.” 

Hendery laughs. “You mean wherever you can tolerate being for longer than a month.” 

“And that’s east?” Dejun asks. He’s on the offense, digs for information disguised as peaked interest. Dejun has always prided himself for making his own decisions when it comes to who to trust. It’s a two way introduction that Ten has presented. _Dejun, meet my informant. Taeyong, meet my closest friend._ Whatever Dejun does with that introduction and how he feels about it is entirely up to him. 

“For now,” Taeyong says, eyes hiding a slight suspicion. Ten can feel a slight wall of protection being built. Taeyong must’ve remembered that Dejun, even after everything, is a Viet. Someone whose throat he would’ve been paid to slit had he not fought tooth and nail for his freedom years back. 

Ten can guess at the game Taeyong is playing in his own mind. If anything, Lee Taeyong likes shocking people with information. He likes having the upperhand, knowing more than all the people in the room. Digging at them and hurting them if he feels like it. 

_I used to be a Miao rider,_ Ten is waiting for him to say, instead Taeyong turns away from Dejun. “Hen, where do you fit?” 

Dejun’s eyebrow raises slightly at the nickname. Ten knows Taeyong saw it too. Hendery, however, pushes right through the tension in the room. “This shithole I guess,” he says with a grin. “Fits so well you’d think I was born into it.” 

They jump from topic to topic as the sky outside grows dark. Dejun ashes into an ashtray—one Hendery made him get after a week of him living with them because Hendery was done finding cups with ash—as conversation wanders from planning their way east to Taeyong telling them an anecdote about one of the sailors in his village that claims to have been taken in by mermaids.

Finally, when the sun has fully set and the moon has been out for a while, Taeyong cuts to the chase. The mention of the word desert creates an immediate silence in the room. “It’s a quiet ride,” Taeyong adds. 

All of their ears wait in anticipation for Taeyong to elaborate. He stays silent for so long Ten has to step in with a question he can redirect his focus to. “How far did you go?” 

“Not that far.” Ten places a hand on Taeyong’s knee, a silent encouragement. “The first couple of miles are easy,” Taeyong says. All of them nod even if they can’t imagine what it must have been like. 

“The sun burns but you get used to it, there are no nomad tribes, since there are no watering holes. Not there.” Taeyong places his own hand on top of Ten’s. “I got a couple more miles in before I knew I had to start thinking about turning back sooner rather than later if I didn’t want to die from dehydration. Water runs out faster than you think, if you haven’t lost track of how long you’ve been riding already.” 

Taeyong takes a breath and squeezes Ten’s hand. “I could’ve kept going for another couple of days, again, it seemed that I’d been there longer than I actually was but there was no hint of anything, no sign of something being wrong, just sand. Miles and miles of sand.” 

Ten squeezes back. “I would’ve turned back too.” Ten can see from Taeyong’s smile that he appreciates the lie. 

Taeyong clenches down on Ten’s hand just a little more. Ten can see it again, the consideration about sharing information fighting a battle in his mind. “You did well, Yongie,” Ten whispers to him, meaning it. 

“Yeah Taeyong it takes more than bravery to do what you did,” Hendery says, voice earnest. “I wouldn’t ride willingly into the desert for love or money.” 

Taeyong looks up from where he had been staring a hole into the wooden floor. He slowly lets a smirk overtake his lips. “I met some of the Ba tribe while on my way back. They’re quite something huh.” 

At the mention of the Ba tribe both Hendery and Ten can’t help but perk up. Ten knows Taeyong isn’t telling something. He decides to accept Taeyong’s wish and save it for later. 

“Did you get to meet Yukhei?” Ten asks. 

“No,” Taeyong says, shaking his head, “unfortunately not. But I did meet a friend of his, Jungwoo.” He looks at Ten and Hendery for confirmation. 

Hendery nods in acknowledgement. “They’ve been friends for a while,” he says, a fond smile on his face. 

“I might have used your name to get on their good side,” Taeyong tells Ten sheepishly. 

Ten laughs. “That’s okay.” Ten and Jungwoo might have never met directly, but Ten and Yukhei have shared enough meals together for the topic of crushes to come up. Ten knows about Jungwoo’s adorable clumsiness and how cocky he can get despite never having been introduced to one another. 

The same goes for Yukhei, he knows about the boy that tried to kill Ten and then tried to woo him. Succeeding luckily only in the latter. Yukhei must’ve talked about Taeyong to Jungwoo, gods know Ten has talked about both of them at length to Hendery even before Yukhei came around to the house to finally introduce himself so Hendery could put a face to a name. 

And besides Jungwoo, a lot of the Ba tribe know Ten by reputation and otherwise by legend. They’ve seen Yukhei teach Ten how to ride a sand lion, and they’ve seen him eat shit when he failed miserably the first couple of tries.

“How’s Jungwoo?” Hendery asks, genuinely interested. 

“Recovering,” Taeyong says, making everyone in the room lean forward in their seats. “Sprained his wrist a couple of days before I came across him, sand lion accident.” 

“They’re real?” Dejun asks, eyes wide in wonder. “I thought sand lions were just made up creatures to keep the general population away.” 

“Quite real alright, pretty hard to miss,” Hendery says. “One is about the size of the couch Ten and Tae are sitting on. Lazy creatures they are too, that is until they get scared.” 

Ten leans forward in his seat, his feet slipping out from under him. “There’s a legend that the mother of the suns uses sand lions to travel back east every evening.” 

Hendery laughs but Dejun’s eyes twinkle just a little brighter. “They can go underground?” 

“It’s how they hide,” Ten explains. “They dig themselves into the sand when they feel they’re in danger.” 

Taeyong takes pity on Dejun and thumps him on the back in comfort. “I didn’t believe they were real either until I saw them with my own eyes.” 

Dejun turns to Taeyong. “Did you ride one? Are the tournaments real too then?” he asks in a gush. 

“I didn’t get the chance, Jungwoo offered me to stay but I felt like I’d stayed away long enough already.” Taeyong’s eyebrows turn down into a frown. “I don’t know if they’re doing tournaments this year.” 

At this, Ten’s head snaps over to Taeyong. “Why?” It’s not only that he and Hendery had been planning to attend this year—as Yukhei’s hype man while he would blow everyone out of the water—but it’s the fact that the tournaments are tradition. Unlike most tribes that live past the southern borders of the Mainland, the Ba tribes don’t stay in one place. They’re nomads, travelling around in bite size groups. The tournaments are where friends reunite every year, them getting called off is something that warrants more than just confusion. 

“I might not have found anything in the desert,” Taeyong starts, “but Jungwoo and his tribe told me they feel it too. There is something going on and it’s upsetting the horses but most of all the sand lions. They’re even faster to go underground these days. They keep mewling in distress. We travelled past a cluster of them with all their heads pointed north just staring at the horizon, unmoving.” 

Ten leans back into his seat in contemplation, he shares a look with Hendery who looks as stumped as he feels. 

“They’re waiting to see if the lions will settle down but I don’t think what’s happening in the desert will stop anytime soon. Was there any news from the east while I was gone?” Taeyong asks. 

Ten shakes his head but Dejun cuts in, “A woman at the market said the catch the past few weeks has been lesser than other years. She thought it was weird because there haven’t been any bad storms lately.” 

“That _is_ weird,” Taeyong muses. “We’re approaching peak season.” 

Dejun’s eyebrows are furrowed in concentration. He’s staring at the ground, trying to work something out. “What about the north?” he asks. “South is the same as ever but what about the north?” 

The four of them look at one another, but no one has an answer to share. 

“Guanheng, don’t you have any informants in the north?” Dejun asks. 

Ten doesn’t miss the look Taeyong shoots him. It’s a surprised one mixed with amusement. _Later,_ Ten conveys back with his eyes. 

“The real north doesn’t much like to be contacted,” he says.

Hendery nods along with him. “There’s a reason the palace keeps its distance. Nothing can touch the north,” Hendery says and then, with a laugh, “it’s too cold.” 

Next to Ten, Taeyong hums in agreement. His hand is still on Ten’s, now quietly rubbing circles on top of it absentmindedly. 

Ten clears his throat. Three pairs of eyes look at him with expectation. 

“The real north is even more closed off than the south,” Ten explains. “They follow the old religion the closest, still make offerings, too.” 

He hears the sharp intake of breath from Dejun. 

Ten pushes on. “Not humans, not anymore, at least not before the mountains. Once you pass those though, who knows.” 

“You don’t take commissions from people that far north?” Dejun asks. 

Hendery lets out a laugh, but it's subdued, nothing like the usual free sound that comes out of his throat. “There’s no one to commission us there, at least not anyone human.”

For the second time that evening, Dejun looks flabbergasted. His mouth has fallen slightly open and his eyes have widened again, ready to soak up more information. “Trolls,” he whispers, like if he said it any louder he would summon one right into the living room. “It can’t be.”

“And yet it’s true,” Hendery says. “The people in the palace don’t talk about it, most think they’re a myth like you, but a select few know.” 

“Easterners too, they trade their catch with the north but know not to go deep into the land itself,” Taeyong adds. 

“There’s a difference, you know,” Ten says. Hendery already knows what he will say but he leans in just as curiously as the other two. “The trolls are asleep, the frost giants aren’t.” 

Dejun perks up into his seat. “The guy who I won my horse from said he had giant’s blood. I thought he was just making up nonsense, being drunk and all.” 

Hendery’s eyebrow lifts in amusement. There is only one guy in the south that holds any giant’s blood. One who likes to gamble, and is good at it until he hits a certain point of intoxication. 

“He also said he is known as the best horse rider across the land. A fool, truly, he couldn’t even stay in his saddle.” 

Ten is looking at Hendery who is looking right back at him, biting his lip to stop the laugh that keeps bubbling up in his throat. 

Taeyong interrupts with the careful murmur of the word, “jotun.” The laughter in Ten’s own throat disappears. 

“What was that?” Dejun asks. 

“Jotun,” Taeyong says, louder. Ten’s hand twitches on Taeyong’s knee. “It’s the word easterners use for giants.” 

Dejun joins in too. “We say ettin.” 

“They’re elemental based,” Hendery says with a smile, ready to get specific. 

Ten’s own voice interrupts him before Ten even realizes he has spoken. “They’re also known for defying the gods.” He doesn’t know how he even knows that information. The only thing he knows is that his throat has gone a bit dry. It’s gone by swallowing once, but the weird feeling lingers. The feeling that he has heard someone press that thought into his brain long and hard, like he has been lectured on it. 

Even Hendery is surprised at the information. “How do you know?” he asks. 

“Yukhei told me once,” Ten says. He doesn't know why he lies. Taeyong’s thumb has gone back to rubbing circles into the back of Ten’s hand. Ten rips his thoughts away from where they have drifted into space and focuses on the touch. He looks back up at Hendery, there’s not just concern written on his face, his brows are furrowed, like he’s trying to look through Ten’s skin. 

“I heard the giants in the north speak a different language,” Ten says. Luckily Hendery picks up on the hint. 

“They do,” he says mysteriously, having everyone once more lean in. “They learnt it from the trolls.” 

* * *

It’s nice, having Taeyong under him. With one hand he keeps Taeyong’s head balanced in a gentle grip, occasionally letting his thumb rub over Taeyong’s lips just to hear that soft laugh. Ten’s right hand holds one of the knives Taeyong carries on his person. It’s light in his hand, easy for close combat, even easier to miss when not paying attention. It’s sharp and glides over Taeyong’s skin smoothly. 

Ten’s legs are clad in old pyjama pants, a towel slung over them to clean the knife on. He swings his legs slightly as he works, feeling the muscle of Taeyong’s thighs flex under him. He’s being steadied by two hands on his ass that keep wandering. 

One of Taeyong’s hands moves under his shirt, it's hot against his back even if it doesn’t do anything but just press against his skin. The other hand squeezes and Ten grins, moving slightly forward. Even half hard, Taeyong keeps his patience. 

It’s only after Ten has cleared the foam from the lower half of his face with the towel and leans back to appreciate his work that Taeyong acts on what he wants. He pulls Ten forward into a kiss, his hand pushing Ten’s shirt up even more. Ten leans back, let’s Taeyong take his shirt off and attack his chest with kisses. He can’t contain the whine he lets out when Taeyong’s mouth finds a nipple. His hand finds Taeyong’s hair like second nature. He pulls and smiles to himself at the appreciative sound Taeyong lets out. The mouth on his chest travels upwards to Ten’s neck, Taeyong stopping his kisses there to nuzzle into the skin. 

“Can I still mark you?” he asks. 

Like always, Ten responds, “Of course.” 

Taeyong doesn’t get right to it though, he pulls Ten back into a kiss, and Ten remembers how easy it is to fall back into tempo with Taeyong. Ten grinds down, searching for friction, does it again when he finds what he wants even if it’s not enough. Taeyong gasps into the kiss and Ten takes the opportunity to push his tongue into Taeyong’s mouth. It’s nothing but a sloppy kiss, slowly getting more heated as Taeyong drags Ten even more forward. The towel falls to the ground, but Ten doesn’t even bother looking where it lands. Those are problems for tomorrow, right now, though, “Are we going to fuck here or are you going to take me to bed.” 

Taeyong throws his head back and lets out a throaty laugh. It’s loud into the silent room and Ten can’t help but love it. He lets his tongue create a path up Taeyong’s neck, licks over the adam’s apple and continues on until he is at Taeyong’s chin. He presses a kiss there, and looks up into Taeyong’s eyes. “Gods, Ten,” he says. His eyelids have drooped down and there is desire in that gaze. He picks Ten up, stumbles a little because his body is still recovering from his travels but he throws Ten on the bed with ease. Let’s him lie there and watch as he strips his own clothes off. Ten is happy they kept the lights on. 

Black hair looks good on Taeyong, even when it’s a mess and dripping water onto the pillow because he didn’t dry it well. His arm is swung around Ten’s waist, his fingers back to rubbing circles into Ten’s skin. They’re back in bed after a shower Ten pushed Taeyong to take, Taeyong might have objected at first with arguments of tiredness but once in the bathroom he was all too quick to pull Ten under the stream with him, ready for another round, that faked slouch gone from his body. 

Ten lets his eyes fall closed, but before he can drift off, Taeyong clears his throat. It’s a quiet action, but in the silence of the room it is unmistakable. Their pillow talk has never been the epitome of normal, and Ten suppose that what he meant as _later_ back in the living room means _now._

They’ve cut the lights, but Ten knows Taeyong is waiting for him to open his eyes, just to be sure. Ten does, because it’s Taeyong, and even if Ten’s body feels like it could sink right into the mattress he knows his friend needs his attention right now. 

“You didn’t turn back when you said you did, did you?” Ten asks, because it feels as good a starting point as any. 

Taeyong isn’t even surprised to have been caught in his own unassuming lie. “Was I that transparent?” 

“No,” Ten says, smile calm and genuine, “I’ve just known you for too long.” 

Taeyong laughs, drags him a bit closer, whispers into his hair, “I rode for another day or two but it didn’t feel right. You know how the air feels when something bad is about to happen?” 

Ten thinks of salt, thinks of having to plug his ears against a voice, thinks of a black void. He nods. 

“My skin started to feel wrong,” Taeyong takes a breath, “that’s when I knew I had to turn around if I wanted to keep my sanity.”

Ten turns his face up so he can look into Taeyong’s eyes when he asks his question. “Weird how?” He can see Taeyong leave, go back to that place in his mind, remember what he felt then. 

“Like you’re slipping away from reality.” 

Ten squeezes Taeyong's shoulder, bringing him back. 

“My horse was exhausted, I was exhausted. We couldn’t find our way back.” 

That’s an easy detail Ten missed, the horse. Taeyong didn’t arrive at the cottage on horseback. 

“I didn’t so much as stumble upon Jungwoo and the others as much as they found me.” Taeyong shrinks in on himself just slightly. Ten waits for him to go on. It takes some time before Taeyong can push the next sentence out. “Dehydrated, fallen from my horse that was lying dead next to me, miles and miles away from the course I was supposed to follow.” 

_I’m sorry,_ Ten wants to say. _You fucking fool,_ he wants to yell. 

“You did well Taeyong,” he whispers instead. Grips Taeyong’s shoulder long and hard so he knows Ten means it. “You did well.” 

“Yeah?” Taeyong asks, quietly. 

“Yeah.” Ten doesn’t have to tell him to never pull something like this again, he has a feeling Taeyong won’t want to try. “I’m glad you’re here now.” 

Taeyong nods. “While riding out there I realized I couldn’t die. I have things to come back to, a life I’m trying to build.” 

“And you can Yong,” Ten says, “you still can.” 

Taeyong is silent for a while, his thoughts somewhere else. Maybe in the east, most likely still in the desert. Taeyong confirms Ten’s suspicion when he opens his mouth to talk again. 

“The answer is there though,” Taeyong says. “Hidden between sand and surrounded by crows cawing, it’s there.” 

After a while, Ten feels the hand on his side still and hears Taeyong’s breathing become subdued as the boy falls asleep. Even Taeyong can’t keep agonizing over the same memories, although Ten is sure he is taking his thoughts with him into his dreams. 

Ten’s own dreams start out the same as always. But there’s something pushing against the edges of his brain, a memory perhaps, another voice, this one not that of a girl but something older, something ancient, something he knows from years he can’t recall. 

It’s deep and kind, speaking in a language Ten knows is not one he uses in his daily life but one he can still understand. When he tries to talk back, to let the voice know that he is here, he wakes up with strange words in his mouth and no recollection of what he was trying to answer to.

* * *

Hendery’s suppliers are all starkly different from one another. Some of them are paranoid, some of them battered warriors, some of them have shrill voices and some of them no voice at all. Actually that’s only one supplier, the one who Ten likes the most, and the one Hendery trusts the most. Not just because he can’t give away their location because he has no tongue to speak with, Jaehyun can very much write, it’s because Jaehyun also hates the empire, and in turn sticks to the black market instead of the normal population. 

When Jaehyun rides into the clearing, he’s standing, waving one hand and holding the reins that connect to the two horses that pull the wagon in the other. His smile is wide, putting his cut up mouth on display. Jaehyun misses one front tooth, but that has never stopped him from appearing joyful. 

He draws the horses to a stop right in front of the cabin and throws the reins to Hendery who is there to catch them. Jaehyun jumps down with a non comical grunt which Ten has learned over the better part of their transactions means, _you better fucking help._

As Hendery unties the horses and leads them to a fence to retie them so they can drink water and get out of the sun for a while, Taeyong and Dejun help Ten and Jaehyun unload the cart.

It’s a lighter load than they’ve had before but their supplies still take up over half of the inside of the wagon. There’s steel plates like always, easier carried by two people than one. There’s some bones—probably tiger and duck—wool, wood, iron, other metals like copper, thread, some new tools, and a big barrel containing wine that is only brewn in the east. It’s Hendery’s favorite, something he stole sips of while still living in the palace and one of the only things he missed when he walked out. 

After getting the legal stuff out first, the real materials appear. Most if not all is for Hendery to work with. There are slimy creatures in tins, suspicious looking parts in glass jars. There’s flowers, poisonous and not, pressed together in stolen books. These things are new, a pool Hendery is trying to dip his toe in. 

When all is cleared out, the only thing besides the books that Ten is really interested in comes into view. It’s jars with sterilized tendons in them. Only two, because tendons are expensive, especially when they are from dragons. 

Dejun picks one up to admire and even Taeyong seems impressed, leaning in for a closer look. Jaehyun grunts a word and Ten translates, “They’re real.” 

Ten laughs and answers himself, “We wouldn’t expect anything else from you Jae.” 

Jaehyun shrugs, motions with one hand to Dejun and Taeyong who are still crowding around the jar, then motions with one thumb to the cabin. Ten nods. “Sure, we’ll join you in a bit. Pour yourself a drink, we have something we want to discuss with you.” 

Jaehyun's head falls to the side in consideration but he decides to save his questions for later, he himself also eager to get out of the sun. 

“Dragons don’t live anymore,” Dejun states, then looks up, eyebrows high and amused. “Or is this another thing I have spent my life long believing only for you to now tell me otherwise.” Besides Dejun, Taeyong is also waiting for a response. 

“No they are very much extinct,” Ten reassures. “I promise you won’t see one carrying the suns from east to west.” It’s an age old tale, how the mother of the suns used to tie dragons in front of her carriage to help her cross from one side of the world to the other, only for her to dispose of them once the crows that carry the suns were fully grown. Seven crows, one for every sun that each has its own name. It’s the sixth day today, and Chenle shines down on them heavy and hard. 

“Then how does he get them?” Taeyong asks. 

Ten grabs the last jar himself and closes the flap of the wagon. He urges the two to follow him back inside. “Why don’t you ask him yourself?” 

In the end, Jaehyun agrees. After a consideration period that takes about less than a minute and a motion for another taste of wine, Jaehyun agrees to take them as far east with him as he needs to go. He says there’s always something to gain in the east, people there have deep pockets like here, but at least there they are willing to dig into them. 

Even if Jaehyun is glad for the company on what would otherwise be another long journey of solitude, he won’t just take them with him out of the kindness of his heart. He might not be a born and bred business man, but he has certainly grown into the role. He drives a hard bargain and in the end convinces Hendery to let him take some of the weapons Hendery has made with him to sell. Hendery will get a cut of course, because after everything Jaehyun is still a fair man. 

They stock up the wagon with food and drink, sneaking in a little wine of Hendery’s when he pretends not to look. Hendery makes sure Ten is stocked up on clean arrows he keeps stashed in his workplace, says he will try to incorporate the poison Ten has brought him from the spider for the next batch of arrows he will make from the dragon tendons. He polishes Dejun’s sword and gives Taeyong one of the smaller knives as a little gift he can hide in his boot. Hendery slips Jaehyun a knife a size larger, uttering the words _you never know,_ and then, a little louder, _not with that mug of yours._ It earns him a slap on the shoulder and a friendly headlock. Jaehyun takes it anyway, even if he already has two knives strapped under his seat. 

Saying goodbye has never come easy to Ten. In his mind it’s a task he always pretends to forget. One Hendery unfortunately always remembers. 

Ten watches as Taeyong and Hendery pat each other on the back in good luck, he gives Hendery and Dejun space when they reach for one another. And finally he steps into Hendery’s arms with a body he wishes wasn’t stiff. 

“I expect you in by ten,” Hendery says, a joke back from the palace days when their biggest worries were how to trick the guards. “Or ten thirty, if you are on your best behaviour.” 

Ten laughs into his arms, can feel Hendery smile against his own shoulder. “I’ll try to be nice,” Ten says. 

“A miracle in the making.” 

Ten laughs again, loud and genuine. 

Hendery grabs Ten’s shoulders. “Come home after a while would you.” 

“Of course,” Ten says. 

“I understand if you want to linger a little longer this time,” Hendery says, eyes very obviously pointing to Taeyong who is already settling down next to Jaehyun on the cart, being shown how to work the horses with the double reins. “I know,” Hendery cuts in before Ten can say anything, one of his hands raised up to stop Ten from talking. “It’s not like that, but still, if you want to linger east a little I wouldn’t blame you. Just know you always have something to come home to.” 

“I promise I’ll be back,” Ten says, meaning it. “Don’t finish all the wine before I do.” 

Hendery grins. “I’m not making promises I can’t keep.” 

* * *

It’s a long journey, but Ten had forgotten how good Taeyong is for company on the long ones. He likes to sing, and does so loudly, Jaehyun next to him on the cart tapping his feet to the beat and nodding his head as a voice of his own. It’s mostly eastern songs, ones the fisherman sing in the early mornings when they thread onto the water and ones they sing when they come back every evening, good catch or not. Jaehyun recognizes some of them, Ten and Dejun less than a handful. And yet all of them can imagine the water and the waves, Ten lets his head lean back and lets his brain think of the sea, stopping himself only when he feels his thoughts going the wrong way. 

He dreams every night of that same space, somewhere not in this world, with a language that humans don’t understand. He tries to speak the words, repeat them as he hears them in his dreams but they fly away from his tongue when he opens his mouth. 

Dejun asks Taeyong if he can sing a song from the south. Because even if he hates the people there, it is still his home, and even Dejun gets homesick. Dejun’s surprised when Taeyong knows a couple by heart. Ten is long glad Taeyong is smart enough to stray away from marching songs. 

Ten himself starts a song Yukhei taught him, another singer that will belt out notes when soaring across deserts or when drunk in bars and losing at craps, badly, but always with a smile on his face. 

When they run out of songs, Jaehyun starts stomping his feet on the cart and forms a beat off the top of his head, Taeyong spouting out new words that seem to keep on coming and change mile after mile. 

They pass through Gaoyang, one of the busiest cities that might only be topped by Youyu—the city closest to the palace. Jaehyun stops to make trades and sells some of the weaponry that Hendery gave him, not the most expensive ones though, he holds onto those. Dejun and Ten also get out of the cart to explore a bit of the city. Ten leaves his bow and arrows with Taeyong who stays in the back of the wagon, snoring between crates and making sure the horses drink their fill. 

After days of open fields and muddy roads it’s strange to walk on stone. The market is buzzing with people and noise. Screams from every vendor trying to pull people in with cheap prices, customers haggling to go even cheaper. There’s the clang of pots and pans and the sizzle of fire. The smell of smoke is nothing compared to the smell of food. Different kinds of meat everywhere, being cooked right in front of your face. There’s an unmistakable lack of fish, the ones that were being sold long gone, probably long before they entered the city. 

Dejun lets himself go and indulges in meat speared onto sticks and dumplings. He buys extra rice balls and hotpot to share later with the rest. This is the last city they’ll stop in before crossing over into the east, Dejun takes what he can get. 

Ten finds a stand with little trinkets strew about. He thinks he recognizes one of the substances in the bottles as something Hendery once experimented with. There’s a little hand mirror and Ten holds it up in front of Dejun so the man can see how the progress of his beard is going. He finds a brush and buys it for the horses but more specifically for Minki. She has carried them from south to northwest and now she will carry them east. Even if Ten and Dejun switch between who goes in the back of the wagon and who gets to ride Minki every day, she works hard, and Ten would like to repay her how he can. 

Gaoyang leads them to Gaoxin. While the cities might not be even a two day ride away from one another—Ten and his group do it in three, because the wagon holds them back and they aren’t in a rush anyway—the difference could not be more stark. The boots people wear are accustomed to rain and made to walk on muddy ground, no one is wearing open shoes, not even the richer folk. Another thing that stands out is that not only the vendors have calluses on their hands, the consumers do too. 

It might only be in his head, but Ten thinks the air feels different here, as open as the land and the people that live on it. The changes are slight but they are there, only coming fully into sight the further they get into eastern territory. 

In Gaoyang, the horses had to pull the wagon over little stones, making it hard to sleep even if you had finally gotten used to the rattling of the cart itself. The east doesn’t sprinkle her roads from one city to the other with cobble, it leaves that to the inner cities only, wanting to preserve as much of its natural self as it can. 

Jaehyun had told them he would take them as far as he needed to go, Ten knows that milepoint was passed two nights back. The east pulls people in further than they want to go, and somewhere along the way that original want is forgotten and replaced by a new desire. There’s a reason why Ten ventured out here with Dejun so often instead of staying in the Outerland with its boring overtowering city walls. 

It’s hard to turn your back on a land where the rolling plains are green on every side and where those plains don’t have warriors lurking in them. It’s safe, sound, and addicting enough that you can inhale a breath full of air and still want more. It’s quiet too, in some places. 

They decide to forego stopping in Chiyou, the biggest city in the east and far and away the best gambling city on the entire Main and Outerland, to carry on to their destination. Jaehyun is in it for the long haul now, Ten can see it in his eyes. 

He regrets not being able to see the nightlife of Chiyou, something Yukhei had introduced him to when they were still teenagers in the form of making Ten watch him lose at cards and then at die the entire night. But Ten supposes he might veer to it on his way back, whenever that would be. Maybe win Hendery a little price that he can display on the mantle. 

Taeyong spends less time at the front of the cart with Jaehyun and more time in the back of the wagon, legs hanging over the edge and looking at the country that passes by. Ten doesn’t know if he is watching his freedom slip away from him, or if he is remembering something he willingly doesn’t want to go back to. 

The only thing Ten knows is that Taeyong wants him to meet someone once they get to wherever the hell their end destination is. A certain someone Taeyong considers a friend, and Ten can’t help but let his curiosity grow. He hasn’t met any of Taeyong’s friends, didn’t know Taeyong had someone close to him he could consider one. 

It makes sense though, Ten had a feeling Taeyong didn’t only mean him and Hendery when he said he had something to come back to. Besides exhaustion from the road, Ten also feels ecstatic to meet someone important in Taeyong’s life. 

Day by day, the sea gets closer. Ten can not only smell it—the sting of salt heavy in the air—but he can also feel it in his bones. They are dragging the journey out and all of them are aware of it. Ten’s mind is split, he missed this, exactly this, riding to the end of the world in open air and a landscape he hasn’t seen before. But at the same time, the other half of his brain is telling him it feels like he is delaying his own execution. 

Finally, after too many days of the suns being dragged across the sky, days Ten long ago stopped keeping track of, Lai Yi appears on the horizon. “There it is,” Taeyong says, having retaken his original spot next to Jaehyun at the front. Dejun peaks his head out of the wagon at the exclamation, even if it had not been loud at all. Ten rights himself in his own seat on Minki’s back, just a little bit. Anticipation is singing in his veins and he can’t help but feel contentment. _There it is,_ he repeats in his own head. 

All sluggishness is thrown out the window at Taeyong’s first mention of wanting a _real_ drink, Hendery’s wine long finished and done _._ They ride through the night, now that their end destination is in sight they do not want to stop. 

Ten knows it can’t be possible, not for at least another hundred miles, but as the moon beckons the sea closer, tells the water to rise just a bit towards her, Ten thinks he can hear the waves. 

* * *

A bit of foam gets stuck in the beginning of Dejun’s beard and it makes Ten snort into his own drink at the sight. Dejun has been refusing to shave ever since they got to Lai Yi, says he wants to try out the new look, thinks he looks mature. Ten can’t exactly disagree with that statement, but he also wishes he could send the image of Dejun and his ragged half grown beard to Hendery. He ends up writing about it instead, in excruciating detail. 

Lai Yi is surprisingly small. It’s not underwhelming at all, just different from what Ten had expected. It’s not like the fisher villages closer to the shore, but it isn’t like the inner cities either, it’s something in between. It’s a place that rests on a branched off part of the eastern land, and even in that branch, it finds itself in the middle. 

“Why here?” Ten had asked Taeyong when they first arrived. If you could pick anywhere on the east coast to officially settle, why here. 

Taeyong had focused his gaze on a spot over Ten’s shoulder, looking at something only he could see. “It felt right,” he had responded, and left it at that. 

Ten figures out what Taeyong means two days into his stay. He finds what Taeyong is talking about in the laughter of the people, the smiles on their faces as they go about their day. Everything seems so easy here, like you can slow down for a second without having to fear missing out on anything. Ten finds what Taeyong is talking about in Johnny’s terrible humor, and his even worser ale. 

“I never actually said the drink would be good,”Taeyong had told him after the first sip, watching with amused eyes as Ten had spit the beer right back into the cup. 

Jaehyun had taken the bad booze as a personal offense and immediately dragged Ten to translate for him as he told Johnny off for living in _the_ part of the world with the best alcohol and instead of using any of _that_ he is serving _this._ Seven minutes later, Jaehyun became Johnny’s new supplier. 

Ten finds what Taeyong is talking about in the way Johnny doesn’t even need good booze to have his tavern full every evening. Johnny is a people person, and it shows in how he greets everyone by name who comes to the bar itself to order. He has three kids running around serving drinks, three kids who all equally want his praise and have all adapted that charisma of his. 

Johnny half jokes that Ten can get a job here if he stays, half jokes because Ten can see there is truth in his eyes. Even if Ten has no plan on staying for longer than necessary, the fact that Johnny simply offered strikes a cord in him. 

In his next letter to Hendery he writes how he has suddenly found himself helping out in a tavern, serving drinks while one of the original servers, Yangyang, is telling people left and right that Ten is trying to steal his job. Between the margins of the letter, Ten puts that he would like to suckerpunch the kid in his face more often than not. But he doesn’t know if Yangyang is _actually_ Johnny’s kid because he sure as hell whines like he is, and besides, Dejun has also taken a liking to Yangyang simply because he gets on Ten’s nerves, so killing him and secretly disposing of the body would probably not go over well. 

A week later a hawk tracks Ten down just as he is weighing two hoof picks in his hands, trying to decide if Minki would object to her hooves being cleaned out by something that has a bright orange handle. 

Hendery’s letter starts off by saying he would like to meet this Yangyang, he thinks they have quite a few things in common. Hendery also writes that Jungwoo sent for Ten to come check things out in the southwest. He goes on to say that he will go in Ten’s stead, seeing as Ten is currently too busy following a new career path as server.

Ten knows there is information he isn’t being told. But he trusts Hendery, sometimes even more than he trusts himself. Maybe Hendery can even find out what is going on with the sand lions, that is more his area of expertise after all, Ten only knows where to shoot them to drop them. 

Still, something doesn’t sit right with him. Ten picks the orange hoof scraper over the boring one and leaves for work trying to remember if Jungwoo has ever sent a letter directly addressed to him before. 

Besides everything, Ten really finds what Taeyong was talking about when he hears the singing. It isn’t just the people in Lai Yi that like to sing, it isn’t just the fishermen and the shopkeepers and Johnny when he’s cleaning out glasses with a dirty dish towel that has seen better days, it’s the flowers, too. 

The rolling plains are pretty on a good day. The chrysanthemum fields, however, are gorgeous, no matter how hard it rains. Johnny tells him that people from all over the land travel to see the eastern flowers. It makes Ten laugh, thinking, _I suppose I’m one of them._

To his surprise, it’s Yangyang that ends up going with him the most to listen to them. He accompanies Ten on his off days to the top of different hills, just to sit there with him and listen as the flowers sway in the breeze. It’s the only time Ten finds Yangyang to be silent. 

That is until one day Yangyang opens his mouth and throws out the fact that people gift chrysanthemums to the elderly here, for long life and good luck. He then turns around to Ten and says, “I’ll pluck you some, old man. Can’t have you give out on us now.” 

Ten promptly shoves Yangyang’s head into the still wet grass. It’s not a suckerpunch, but he’ll take what he can get. 

Yangyang complains about it all the way back home to the tavern where he demands Ten pays for his drink, even if drinks for employees are free. He takes one big gulp of the worst beer on the tap, one Johnny refuses to let go of, and beckons Ten closer as he licks away the foam on his upper lip. In hushed tones he starts to talk about the other flowers in the fields. Yangyang does it so quietly, it feels like he is sharing age old secrets. When he gets to plum blossoms he starts taking the trees into account, too. “The sap from them,”he says, “somewhere it’s used as medicine _._ ”

They are both four beers deep now, Yangyang’s cheeks flushed with red and eyes bright with conspiracy as he looks around hastily when Ten asks, “Where?” 

He leans even further in, Ten can smell the alcohol on his breath when Yangyang whispers, even lower than before, “The north.” 

Ten throws his head back and laughs. When he looks back down it's to see Yangyang with a big grin himself, but there is uncertainty in his eyes, afraid of being disbelieved. 

“How do you know,” Ten asks, willing to entertain Yangyang with the benefit of the doubt. 

Yangyang squares his shoulders, puffs out his chest just a little. “I’ve been there.” 

Ten looks at the boy before him. When standing next to Johnny, Yangyang doesn’t even reach his shoulders. “In the north?” Ten asks. “You?” 

Yangyang stands up, stumbling a little from moving too fast. Ten grabs his arm on instinct to stabilize him. 

Yangyang places both his hands on the table and leans back into Ten’s space, he spits out a word, satisfied with himself when he sees Ten’s eyes grow wide. 

Ten doesn’t know if he wants to lean back in shock or jump up in bewilderment, in the end, his body decides to freeze. There are two things, though, that Ten does know. He knows that Yangyang just called him a motherfucker. And the second thing Ten knows is that Yangyang said it in a language Ten has been hearing in his dreams ever since Taeyong came back from the desert. 


	3. Dinner Hour

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dinner Hour — when the sun reaches the Valley of Grief

The next morning isn’t kind to him, and neither is Yangyang. Ten wakes with sun in his eyes, having forgotten to close the curtains in his room the night before. 

He and Taeyong have an arrangement, one Johnny is more than often involved in. Taeyong doesn’t want to settle down, can’t see himself staying in one place yet. Ten doubts Taeyong will ever ride west again, or any other direction that strays too far from Johnny’s tavern for that matter, but that is for Taeyong to figure out. Point in case is, Ten has never been a jealous man, and apparently neither has Johnny, he is fine with waiting for when Taeyong finally commits. And for now, he is content with sharing. 

Ten had come up to Johnny after being in Lai Yi for a week, had straight up told Johnny that he would stop cold turkey with whatever Taeyong and he were doing if Johnny was looking for a future with Taeyong. 

Johnny had laughed and invited him to bed. 

They’ve talked about it since, with and without Taeyong. But it always comes down to this: Taeyong has it in him to settle, to grow old and grey and raise three children lovingly like they are his own. Ten, however, does not. It doesn’t matter that he would have not one but two amazing partners by his side, there would come a point where his skin would start to itch again, where his legs would want to walk again and not stop, a point where he would leave their sides regardless of how much he would want to stay. 

“I know it’s not much comfort,” Ten had told them one night, his head on Johnny’s chest, Taeyong’s fingers rubbing circles into his stomach, “but if there was a place where I wanted to build a future, it would be here.” 

When Hendery told Ten he understood if Ten would want to stay a little longer this time around, Ten no doubt knew he would extend his time in the east. But, that doesn’t mean he would not return. The rumbling in his stomach is there, the urge to jump on a horse and _go._ But it’s weak, not fully formed, maybe a month, maybe two, three if he wants to hitch a ride with Jaehyun, then he will say his goodbyes. 

For now, Yangyang kicks him in his side and tells him to get dressed and grab his bow. 

Instead of taking him to the fields or to Johnny for work, Yangyang takes him into the forest behind the inn and says, “Let’s see how good of a shot you are.”

Yangyang almost fucks up the first attempt, almost. Ten would not deserve his reputation if he could not shoot a running animal, even if it is a squirrel and even if it’s running for its life to hide because Yangyang sneezed and gave away their position. 

“I don’t miss, Yangyang,” Ten states after he pulls the arrow out of the squirrel’s back. 

“Sure you do, shoot that bird,” Yangyang says, turning around and pointing at a bird that has just taken flight. 

Ten turns around and the bird is falling to the ground in less than a second. It lands with a dull thud _._ Yangyang stares at its lifeless form. 

“Beginner’s luck.” 

“Whatever you say, Yang.” 

“Well I’m saying beginner’s luck. Now come on,” Yangyang says, urging Ten deeper into the forest. Ten, despite thinking he will have lost his sanity before the day ends, follows. 

Forty minutes later they are lying face down in the mud, Ten is holding Yangyang down, just out of precaution (and maybe a little bit out of spite). Twenty minutes earlier, Yangyang had scared the buck off by stepping on a stick. Ten won’t let that happen again. 

As a reason for his inability to be still, Yangyang had given that you do not need to be quiet on the sea, which is where he spends his time when he isn’t serving drinks or listening to flowers sing. 

Apparently, he sails, and is goddamn good at it. And apparently, Yangyang has a direct connection to the giants in the north, which is why he speaks the language. It’s something Ten will inquire about further, once the buck is down and Yangyang is not trying to bite at his arm in an attempt to get free. Ten almost can’t distinguish him from the other wild animals that crawl around here. 

Ten holds it out for another fifteen minutes, after which he finally takes pity on Yangyang’s now exhausted form and jumps up, nailing the buck with one clean shot. 

As it falls down, Yangyang rises. “You did that on purpose,” he states. “You let us sit out here for gods know how long on purpose.” 

“I thought it would teach you some patience.” 

Yangyang spits the same word again as back in the tavern, _motherfucker._ This time, Ten doesn’t freeze up, he just laughs and lets Yangyang help him carry the buck all the way back to the village. 

Their little trip doesn’t get spoken about, and neither does the fact Yangyang can speak an age old language that he isn’t even supposed to know. Ten thinks it's the end of it, he has proven he can shoot and served as an afternoon of entertainment. What he doesn’t expect is Yangyang to knock down his door again a week later, the exact same day, the day the sun Jaemin shines. This time, he tells Ten to leave the bow and fix two horses. 

They ride in the opposite direction as last time. Ten is used to big birchwood trees that seem to go up for miles, or oak trees that are as old as time itself with rings inside of them that would take you half as many years to count as that the trees themselves have lived. This time though, Yangyang takes him to what can’t even be described as a forest. It isn’t thick and clustered like Ten is used to. Instead there are little bumps on the meadow that someone who has never been anywhere might consider hills, and out of them, out of them grow trees with thousands of branches, all sprouting pink flowers. 

“Plum blossoms,” Ten whispers under his breath, letting himself admire the sight of them. 

Yangyang slows his own horse down to a trot as well, giving Ten the time to take it all in. 

“You should come here in winter,” he says. “They’re even more vibrant then.” 

“They survive the winter?” Ten asks, amazement in his voice. 

Yangyang laughs. “Survive is an understatement. They seem to thrive in the cold.” 

Somewhere in Ten’s brain, a connection is made. “Is this the only thing they eat, the giants?” 

Yangyang shakes his head no. “They don’t need to eat much at all, they just long for it sometimes. The sap of the trees gets them through winter, all other seasons they’re supplied by villages in the north close to them.” 

“To appease them.” 

“You can think of it like that, yeah.” 

Ten thinks back to the conversation in his and Hendery’s living room. “I thought the east barely traded with the north.” 

“We need to do something to keep our heads above water.” Ten has a feeling Yangyang isn’t talking about the east as a whole. He gets proven right in the next second. “Sure, tourism goes a long way and you see how full the tavern can get, but there’s four of us, five with Taeyong.” 

Yangyang says Taeyong’s name like he has already been adopted into the family. It warms Ten’s heart, knowing Taeyong has a home and people here who he can fall back on. 

“Are you actually Johnny’s children?” Ten asks. He has wondered about the practicalities of it. The absent mother. Maybe illness had taken her, Ten had never asked, scared to trigger unpleasant memories. 

Yangyang seems to pull himself out of his thoughts with a laugh at that question.

“Oh come on,” Ten says, “I can’t be the first person to ask.” 

“You’re not,” Yangyang reassures, “Taeyong asked as well.” He urges his horse to start moving again, closer to the trees with their pink flowers. Ten follows. 

“We’re not, by the way. Yiren and Aisha are twins, though, somehow found their way to Johnny like I did. Yiren calls him dad sometimes. I think Johnny secretly likes it even if it makes him feel old.” 

Ten laughs at that, doesn’t have to see Yangyang’s face to know he is smiling as well. Carefully, he asks, “And you? Do you call him dad?” 

Yangyang’s body rights itself on its own. Ten can see the muscles stiffen, just slightly. “I already have a dad,” he says. His voice is neatly even, like this is something he has practiced telling himself. “He might be dead but he’s still my dad.” 

Ten urges his horse forward, wanting to ride side by side with Yangyang for this conversation. He wants to say he’s sorry, apologize even if it’s not his fault. “You’re right,” he says instead, “him being dead doesn’t invalidate him being your father.” 

Yangyang’s shoulders lose a bit of their tenseness. Unprompted, he explains, “He’s the reason I know the northern language. He used to trade medicine and fish with the frost giants. Taught me the language because even if I didn’t want the same career as him it might still be useful.” 

Yangyang turns to face Ten. “They didn’t kill him if you were wondering.” Ten wouldn’t admit it out loud, but the thought did cross his mind. “Sirens got to him, if you believe in them that is.” 

“I do,” Ten says. The word siren leaves a bad taste in his mouth. He tries to swallow it down but only ends up getting the bad taste stuck in his throat. “Your mom?” Ten asks, as a form of distraction. 

“Threw herself to the rocks when dad died,” Yangyang says. Tone neutral and even. Another practiced sentence. He carries on like nothing happened. “Do you have any siblings?” 

Ten is ready to answer how he always does. With a lie, even if it might not be called a lie if the speaker doesn't know the truth. Instead, Ten looks Yangyang in his eyes and decides to tell him what he knows. Which isn’t much of anything. So he says exactly that. “I don’t know.” 

He thinks about a shrill voice trying to break his eardrums, a name distinctly close to his own, the fact he needed to bury her because he couldn’t live with himself if he didn’t. He thinks about the girl haunting his dreams and adds, “Maybe. If she was she’s dead now.” 

“You know,” Yangyang says, halting his horse once more so he can really look at Ten. “It could be six. If you want.” 

Ten doesn’t know how to respond to that. It’s touching, so touching he almost reevaluates his entire plan of leaving with Jaehyun in three months. There is a thought trying to push its way into his brain. What if he asked Hendery to come east with him. Rebuild their house here, far away from that fucking palace and those fucking people. Maybe he could even convince Dejun to stay. The guy has already bought a new instrument and spends his days playing it while walking through the streets, not yet intent on leaving. They could just fake his death, get missing in action stamped on his name. Dejun would have to live with the story of him being killed on an escort mission circling around, but Ten is sure he’d manage.

His head becomes a big advocate of how good change is, but his heart makes him reel himself back in. The east might be nice, but it would become a bore after a while. Ten is a born and bred traveller, that wouldn’t change by moving from west to east. It’s something to consider though, an idea to take with him when he heads back home. 

“Thank you,” Ten tells Yangyang, who seems to get the hint and challenges to race him to the nearest plum blossom tree, where he can explain to Ten how to get the sap out of the bark. 

* * *

It becomes a ritual, Yangyang barging into Ten’s room at ass o’clock in the morning on the fifth day of the week. Sometimes he asks Ten to bring his bow, sometimes he does not. When he does, they spend their time hunting in the thicker forests closer to the village. Ten learning Yangyang how to shoot a straight arrow and how to track prints in the mud. Dejun sometimes comes with them, all too happy to join Ten in scolding Yangyang when he missteps and alerts their prey. 

When Yangyang doesn’t ask Ten to bring his bow, they stroll through flower fields or spend their time amongst plum trees, getting the sap out of the bark and talking to them in a language Ten is regaining his footing in. Ten jokes that the trees might be listening in on them. Yangyang just shrugs and says, _of course they are._ It sends Ten spiraling and to Taeyong, asking him if the trees here have ears. Taeyong pats him on the back with pitying eyes and murmurs, _luckily they can’t exactly talk back._

The worst part of his stay is when Yangyang takes him out for a weekend to the sea. He proudly shows Ten his boat and Ten would laugh at how childlike Yangyang looks when he is eagerly explaining all its workings and how exactly he has tied certain knots if the stench of salt wasn’t so overwhelming. Despite himself, he lets Yangyang undock the boat. Despite himself, he lets Yangyang steer them to open water. Despite himself, he enjoys it. When he lets himself untangle his nails from the wood of the boat and just feel how the waves move, it's almost calming. 

They spend their night on the sea, floating on the water, the moon shining down on them, big and bright. Ten tells Yangyang about his parents, or rather the lack of them, and Yangyang shares stories about the beginnings of meeting Johnny, setting up the tavern, running around as a server without even knowing how the drinks in the cups tasted. 

At one point, the water becomes almost still as the moon gets obstructed by grey clouds. It tries to shine through, to let its beams fall back onto the waves, but the clouds are too thick. It’s fighting a losing battle, and yet it keeps trying, succeeding in peeking through every once in a while, seamingly teasing, as if it’s saying, _look at me, just try and look._ With it’s last peek before the sun takes over its place, it feels like it’s saying goodbye, a little wink for the road. Ten takes it as a warning. 

When they ride back to Lai Yi, Ten can’t shake the feeling of unease. And he is proven to be right to feel that way. Two months into his stay in the east, he gets a letter. It’s waiting for him on the corner of Johnny’s bar, ready to be opened. Yangyang is next to him, telling Johnny to pour something and excitedly describing how he had let Ten steer for a bit, resulting in them almost crashing into the rocks. 

Two months into his stay in the east, Ten eagerly opens a letter thinking it's from Hendery, but instead gets greeted by three pages of handwriting he doesn’t recognize. 

“When did it arrive?” Ten asks.

Johnny furrows his brows at the hesitance in Ten’s voice. “This morning. Couple hours before you and Yang arrived.” 

Two months into his stay in the east, Ten gets a letter from Jungwoo. It’s not even signed at the bottom, but the content speaks for itself. 

When Hendery had sent him a note declaring he would go west in Ten’s stead, Ten had wracked his brain trying to think of whether Jungwoo had ever directly asked for his help before, if he had ever gotten a letter from the guy. (He hadn’t, the need had never been there). 

Dejun doesn’t even hesitate to say, “Take Minki.” And goddamnit Ten tries to refuse because she isn’t his, but Dejun is basically pushing the reins into his hands. He tries to lie and say he can get a different horse, that a horse not born and bred for hard riding will do, or that he can even wait another two weeks for Jaehyun’s arrival, but Dejun won’t have any of it. He wants to ride with Ten but he knows it would only hold him back. Dejun sees the desperation in Ten’s eyes and says, _go._

Two months into his stay in the east, Jungwoo tells him in hastily scratched down words that barely form sentences that Yukhei has taken a real hit. _Sandstorm,_ Ten thinks he can make out of the messy writing. _Unconscious but stable._

Yangyang is the same in his persistence, he takes Ten into the backroom and hands him a vial of the stuff they’ve been milking out of trees. _Three drops, six if it’s really bad._

He makes Yangyang promise to send some of the stuff to the Ba tribes. “Take three of your best hawks and ask Taeyong for the location. He will know.” Yangyang is confused at first, but then he seems to get it. Realization dawns on him that Ten is not going to the tribes.

Ten leaves within an hour of opening the letter. There is a bag thrust into his arms by Johnny, and afterwards his bow, something he almost forgot in all his haste. He does not get the time to say proper goodbyes, doesn’t get to see Taeyong before he rides, he heads west and does not look back. 

Two months into his stay in the east, Ten learns that Yukhei is alive. The same cannot be said of Hendery.

* * *

On the second day of his journey, the first day of a new week, the sun Mark rises. It’s hot, hotter than it should be when it’s not even mid summer. Ten doesn’t pay it any mind, he has ridden under worse conditions. Minki doesn’t show that it bothers her either, she can feel his distress, can feel his pain, she bore witness to his tears on the first night. She rides on through the heat. 

The thing is, the sun doesn’t set. Ten thinks it’s an after effect of shock, that he might just be making this up, that he is still so high on adrenaline that this is just his mind spinning out. Maybe he’s dreaming, but when he pinches himself, hard, drawing blood, he does not wake. 

Hunting and being hunted over the years has given Ten a good perception of time, one that is better than the average person, when he focuses on it. He has been counting the minutes ever since he rode out of Lai Yi. It should be evening now, long past sunset, and yet the sun does not go down, the moon does not rise. Ten thinks of it winking to him on the water. _One for the road._ Ten shakes the thought out of his head and rides on. 

On the second day of the new week, the sun Renjun rises. After twelve hours it is followed by the sun Jeno, after which the other remaining five suns come out. They all rise up to the heavens and stand fast. Ten would admire it, would himself stand still to look but he does not have the time or the patience, not now, probably never again. 

It is sweltering hot, but luckily he can reroute his travel through forests, and looks to ride through as many of them as he can, glad for the shade. 

Maybe it’s his brain, his mind succumbing to a dizzy spell or it’s just his determination, but he can feel the trees push him forward, encouraging. They lean in towards him, not to intimidate, but to support. It’s like they’re saying, _rush now child, we will watch your back._ He talks back to them in a tongue as ancient as them, thanks them as he skirts along. 

With the suns above him, he has to stop to let Minki drink more often. It’s a bother but he can’t have her passing out on him. He can tell she dislikes the hold ups as much as he does, noses into his hand as an apology, rides longer than she should to make it up to him. 

Ten rereads the letter when they take breaks, he bypasses sleep to go over Jungwoo’s words over and over and over again, committing them to memory unwillingly. _Sandstorm. Sandlions. Wings. Ten. Wings. Unconscious but stable. Missing and presumed dead._

At one point during what Ten assumes is supposed to be night, Minki rips the paper out of his hands and starts to chew on it. He gets angry, starts yelling, uses Yangyang’s word for motherfucker but she doesn’t even flinch. Just stands strong despite her exhaustion and looks at him with her big eyes and chews. Ten walks, his legs carrying him out of pure frustration, Minki three paces behind. He lasts a mile before he drops down and apologizes. He does not cry, it’s too hot to cry. Minki let’s him climb back on. They ride. 

Ten follows a path that travels between Goaxin and Chiyou, not turning to stop at either. He keeps off the main roads, foregoes cities and their busy squares altogether. When the path ends he cuts his own. Ten doesn’t notice when he crosses from east to west, the only thing he knows is that it’s taking too long. 

Hendery was a bit shy when they first met. The only thing Ten knew of the emperor’s child was that he liked raspberries and running, something Hendery still does sometimes back at the cabin before dawn breaks. 

Maybe the reason Hendery first appeared as shy was because he was hiding behind a blacksmith, clutching one of the man’s legs and pretending he was born into a different class than the absolute upper one, the tip of the pyramid. And yet there were smudges of ash on his face, dust on his expensive clothes, and his hair looked like it hadn’t been combed for three weeks straight. Ten took a liking to him at first sight. 

When Hendery introduced himself as that, _Hendery,_ not Guanheng, Ten realized that the shyness was a farce. This boy was far from shy, he just had a secret that needed to be kept, something Ten was willing to do. 

Maybe that’s why Hendery took a liking to him too, because Ten didn’t rat him out to his father or the guards. Or maybe because Ten was the only one around his age running around the palace halls, or maybe because he saw Ten could leave whenever he wanted, and thought maybe if he kept close Ten would take him with him. 

Which Ten did, because within a week of knowing Hendery he had figured out the kid hated staying still, but he hated the palace walls even more. Two weeks in and Ten was calling him Hendery instead of Guanheng in the presence of other officials, otherwise he would get an eyeroll, a movement Hendery had mastered even at a young age. Three weeks in and Ten took him to the stables to learn how to ride a horse. Which Hendery was drastically, drastically bad at. Still is to this day. 

What he lacked in the ability to ride he made up for with his hands. Hendery didn’t need prayers and blessing, he was carrying magic with him at all times, quite literally within hand’s reach. He could craft weapons out of nothing, was the best apprentice the palace blacksmith had ever had even if there had not been many, and to top it all off he had a green thumb. But, despite it all, the thing Hendery loved doing most was inventing. Let him play with chicken bones and self made glue and he’d get you the sharpest knife before dawn. Give him a piece of metal and stay an hour to gawk at how he transforms it. 

Ten did stay. He did watch. He watched those hands move from metal to wood to needle and thread, watched them take apart and put together. Ten watched them clap in excitement or snap when the idea hit, he watched them stomp and punch when the measurements were off or when the materials ran out, and then move again to find a solution. 

They went to a palm reader once. Just for shit’s and giggles (and maybe because Ten wanted to know if other people saw what he did). 

She said Hendery was a royal peasant that would not leave his class no matter how much he tried to build his way out. Apparently she hadn’t taken into account outside factors, such as death. More specifically the death of Hendery’s father. And how Hendery had not had to build a ladder to scale the palace walls at all in the end, just needed to put on his shoes and walk out the gates. 

She had taken one look at Ten’s palms and said _get out._

Guanheng was someone who would not even be named in the history books, he never spent enough time in meeting rooms or the palace itself at all to make an impact, and when he did walk those halls whispers of _bastard_ tended to follow. 

Hendery is someone who will still not make the history books, but Ten likes to think that some bard might sing about them in some tavern a couple of years after their deaths. A song about an unlikely duo that lived in the middle of fucking nowhere, and still got requests from all over the world to come do their bidding. 

The first village he stops at is Shennong. It’s an extension to the west of the city Yan Di, and also the last place to stock up before going further west. Or Desert West, as the people here like to call it. 

The tavern Ten is staying at for the night is probably more crowded than it has been in a hundred years. The tap keeps on running, the thirst never ending. The people around him seem to have lost their sense of time, maybe place, if they are drunk enough. 

He doesn't try to strike up conversation, just takes his meal to a hidden corner of the room and keeps to himself. It's a sludge that's advertised as stew with bread as stale as Minki's hooves. The first spoonful burns his mouth. It makes Ten lean back into his chair for a moment, spoon half in the air as he sighs out the agony of the past days. It's a long sigh, a deep one. It has the man across from him looking up at him with raised eyebrows.

"Long road?" he asks.

Ten let's the spoon drop back into his bowl, a spot of yellow lands on the table. "Longer still."

The man looks at him sympathetically and kindly averts his gaze, leaving Ten to eat in peace. It's the first human interaction Ten has had in weeks though, ever since he left the east.

"What's it like?" he asks as he dips some of the bread in the stew and tries another bite. This one slow, giving himself time to taste. "Anything change as of late?"

The man looks at him over the rim of his glass, eyebrow raised even higher, almost up to his hairline. When he puts his drink down he does so with a laugh.

"Nothing much, plants have been growing quite well I guess."

Ten let's a smile of his own overtake his lips. "Farmer then?" He takes another bite of stew, living off of canned goods and badly dried meat for the past few days almost makes it taste good. Almost. 

The man shrugs, it draws Ten's gaze to the tattoos just peeking out from under his shirt. They aren't formed with stark black lines, on the contrary, they're pale, almost not there to the naked eye. "From time to time." There is muscle in the man's arms, hidden but very much there under the sleeves. You wouldn't be able to tell from just one look but he knows how to handle himself in a fight. Even with a drink in his hand there is a certain awareness to him. He's not from around here, of that Ten is certain.

"You come from further up north?" Ten asks.

"What makes you say that?"

Ten gestures to the man with his spoon. "You don't have the posture of a farmer." He takes a sip of his drink, tilts his head in consideration. "Don't have the posture of an official either."

"Middle class then," the man offers. There's a glint in his eyes. It isn't hostile, nor dangerous, yet Ten is mindful of it.

"Your shirt is too well tailored for just middle class." 

The man laughs again, teeth on full display. They're so white it almost hurts.

"My father used to scold me for having bad posture, still does, from time to time," the man says, look almost fond. "Does yours?"

Ten shakes his head. "He's not around. Left me to scold myself for it I guess."

The look in the man's eyes turns almost sympathetic. Ten can feel there's something he wants to say. In the end, the man does. "I'm sorry," he says.

Ten waves it away. "You don't need to apologize."

"I am sorry, though, I really am." The man's tone is so earnest it makes Ten take another good look at him. His hair is blonde, paler than Ten has ever encountered. His tattoos only appear when the light hits them, they seem to form words or swirls, Ten isn't quite sure which of the two. He knows Yukhei has some tattoos that are similar, but they aren't painted in this kind of ink. Some of the Barbarian tribe members Ten has met carried markings that covered their entire bodies, but they were different, pointing more towards symbols than the flowy script that Ten sees before him. He has seen it prior to today, although he cannot for the life of him remember where.

The man has long ago caught onto his staring, Ten can't be bothered trying to find an excuse, so he uses the truth. "Your tattoos don't look exactly northern." 

"Most people don't notice them at all," the man says, using his pointer finger to draw his left sleeve back, just the tiniest bit. Ten's suspicions are confirmed, the designs do fully run across his arms. "And besides, I never confirmed if I came from the palace."

Ten's head lifts on its own. He feels caught in his own assumptions. "Well do you?"

"I can assure you I am not the palace gardener."

"That doesn't bring me any relief."

"Then let me rephrase: I try and stay as far away from that place as I can. Usually I succeed in it too."

Ten doesn't know why he says it, but it's out of his mouth before he can push it back in, "I have a friend who'd rather die than breach those walls." It brings his thoughts back to Hendery in an instant. He tries to separate any emotional ties, but it has long ago become a wirwar of threads in his mind. _If he's dead,_ Ten thinks, _at least he passed not locked up behind concrete walls._ It gives the smallest of comforts, but Ten takes what he can get.

It's like the man can feel his emotional shift. Ten can see his hands itch to reach out, only a second later realizing they want to reach out to him. He calmly draws his own hands away from the table, lets them fall into his lap, stew barely touched but forgotten.

"I think I must agree with your friend. Although it feels a bit like I'm cheating, dying in my line of work is pretty hard to do."

Ten wants to ask what exactly that work is, but he has a feeling he won't get an answer, at least nothing specific. "How long do people in your line of work live?"

The man laughs again, putting those teeth back on display. "Eons," he says. "If they're unlucky."

* * *

The man has a name and his name is Dal. At least, that's what he insists on being called. He does not care that Ten thinks it's pretentious. Had responded, _I like the mystery,_ when Ten had asked why he did not just say Moon.

In a world where people like Taeyong and Yukhei tower over him, it's nice to be able to look someone in the eye and not have to look up for once. Even if Dal is about the same height, he is older. He carries the air of someone who has been around for a long while. There is no hint of it on his face and body though, there are no crow's feet at the corners of his eyes and his hands are smooth. It's in his eyes, Ten thinks, the years.

Dal, like Hendery, is a terror on a horse. It makes Ten feel more comfortable knowing that this man, like him, is far from perfect. Dal had stroked Minki on her nose before attempting to swing himself on his own. It's a gesture that has Ten drown further into his thoughts about the enigma that this man is. Especially because Minki had let Dal, even leaned into it and closed her eyes.

Minki's approval is the final (and besides his own instincts the only) push Ten needs to take Dal along. They hadn't even spoken about it the night before. The topics had stayed on the safer side, more often than not still clouded in riddles. Never had either of them said they would leave tomorrow, and never had either of them offered to accompany the other along on their journey. Yet here Dal had been, waiting for him at the stable Ten had walked Minki into the night before.

Ten continues on with his journey. Dal and his horse, after one failed attempt, fall into step next to him.

Shennong lies on the path of the Wei river. It's an extension of the Yellow river, one of the few things that is left in memoriam of Hendery's father, Huang Di. 

Decades before, Hendery's father had defeated Yan Di, the flame emperor, to claim the throne for himself. He had done it almost next to the Yellow river where he and his tribe lived, in a battle that under the people has earned the name Battle of Banquan. It had been the first war, and although it had led to a seed being planted into the mind of the entire land that you could use violence to conquer an empire, it also led to the general population admiring Hendery's father. Sure, the noble disliked him. But to the common he inspired hope, being the first emperor to come from a simple tribe that spent its days hunting and gathering.

Huang Di had died in the same manner he had found his life. He had fought the emperor of fire and defeated him to gain a new purpose, and with it, a throne. He had walked along the Yellow river years later, at a slightly older age, and reportedly seen a phoenix, dying not three days later in his chamber.

Hendery had not been around for the death of his father, he had not stayed. He had the intention to, felt it was his duty as a son to hold his father's hand as the people around him readied the palace for a new emperor, Hendery still thinking it would be him. But while on his deathbed, Huang Di had been surprisingly honest. He had told Hendery he would not leave the throne to him, but to someone else, someone he trusted would keep the peace, someone who actually wanted to be there.

Hendery's father had apologized to Hendery for keeping him in what for his son must have felt like imprisonment. Then he had squeezed Hendery's hand and said _go. Try not to burn your fingers on the iron too much._

From Ten, Huang Di had asked to look after his son, thanking Ten when he had agreed with no hesitation. _I'm proud of him,_ Huang Di had told him, _always have been, just like your father would be of you._ The fever had taken him by then, and Ten had assumed the man had simply misspoken. 

Ten tells Dal about the Yellow river, how it stretches from east to the middle of the country, only to make a curve and meander north. Ten is sure Dal already knows this, but still the man listens to him talk carefully. 

He doesn't ask what Ten is looking for, or whom, instead asks Ten to tell him about the east. 

It takes a few minutes to gather his thoughts, but eventually the words come stumbling out all on their own. It's easy, Ten finds, to tell Dal about the east. About the ever stretching meadows and the salt in the air throughout all of the land. The fields full of flowers singing for the ones who care to stop and listen and the hearty laughter in the taverns late at night from men and women alike who have to hold one hand to their belly and another to the table, or the bar, or another person so as not to fall over from laughing too hard.

Before he knows it he's telling Dal about the trees with their pink flowers, something straight out of paradise, almost like a trick of the light. But no, Ten had tried to rub away the color from them, tilted them one way and another in the sun to see if the color would shift or disappear, had even held it under the light of the moon and still the pink had remained. He carries on and on, ending where land meets sea. "The boats are all from wood, some hold figureheads bigger than you and I at their fronts. There was this one, a woman at the front with long hair, her clothes carved to blow in the same direction. It almost seemed to come to life the longer you stared," Ten says with a laugh. "And the crew, they were nice, one had a beard as long as Dejun's might be now. The captain was the biggest mystery of the bunch, he wore an eyepatch but from behind it swirled—"

Ten stops so abruptly Minki almost comes to a standstill with him. He can feel Dal's eyes on him. Ten is not even embarrassed about his rambling, Dal doesn't seem to find it a problem either, judging by the fond look he is giving Ten. His eyes are squeezed together in patience and his mouth is formed into an encouraging smile. He raises one of his eyebrows as if to say _go on._

There are two options, and even if Ten is leaning towards the second one, the one where he jumps to Yangyang letting him steer the boat for a while, he feels the appeal the first option has. _So this is what Taeyong plays with in his mind,_ Ten realizes. To his surprise, it's fun. So he picks the first option, and prides himself for having some guts.

"There were marks peeking out from behind his eyepatch, I think they must've been drawn to circle around his actual eye," Ten explains. He lets himself take in the moment, lets himself feel the enjoyment when he says, "They were almost transparent, not much unlike your own."

Dal doesn't even make the effort to act surprised. He stares at Ten and it feels like he's looking into his soul without even trying to, can see the gears turning inside Ten's head as Ten tries to figure out where to go from here. 

"I'm not a sailor," Dal says, attempting to be helpful. 

"Sailors don't live for eons," Ten adds as explanation. 

Dal nods and gives him a lopsided smile. "Well that's three professions crossed off the list." 

Ten takes a page out of Yangyang's book and says, "You're also not doing anything that requires a horse in any way shape or form, because, quite frankly, and excuse my language old man, but you can't ride for shit." 

"No offense taken son," Dal says, and throws his head back to laugh, almost falling off his horse in the process. 

The company is strange but Ten knows not to take it for granted. They ride alongside the Wei river for miles, letting the horses drink while trying to find the slightest hint of shade every once in a while. Ten understand that the water is a luxury, something he can't count on once he crosses into the desert.

Dal is more open with him now, like the veil has been lifted, just slightly. He is still controlling how much Ten can see behind it, but he is showing some of it nonetheless.

Dal doesn't seem to struggle with the sun as much as Ten. He leaves his head uncovered, not shading the top of his head with cloth but instead displaying his blonde hair. It's not a fashion statement, there is no one here to impress, so it must be because Dal is truly not bothered by the burn of the heat.

He sings too, and it reminds Ten of his trek in the other direction. The hundreds of miles he had spent listening to the stomping of Jaehyun's feet on the wooden cart, the humming of Dejun under his breath, the booming voice of Taeyong, not afraid to be heard.

It makes him miss them, long for their voices and presence. His thoughts drift off to Johnny and the twins, wondering how busy they must be now to keep the people hydrated. Ten can't help but wonder if Yangyang has taken his boat out onto the water since he left. If he has steered north and delivered the shipment, or is waiting for autumn.

He turns his thoughts away from Hendery, because every time he pictures his face, it seems a little less vibrant.

Dal's company is short-lived. A couple of miles after the Wei river ends, just before the sand dunes start, he stops his horse. Ten pulls at Minki's reins in confusion.

He hadn't expected Dal to come all the way with him. Actually, he isn't sure what he had expected at all, isn't quite sure what he expects of himself either.

"You're not coming with," Ten states. He doesn't need confirmation to know it's true, still Dal provides it in the form of a nod.

He stumbles off his horse, Ten not bothering to hide his laughter at the display. He stops grinning though, when Dal hands him his water reserve.

"I can't take that," Ten states immediately. 

"Sure you can," Dal says, pushing it into his hands. Ten doesn't clamp his finger around the canteen.

"You might make it back to the river but you'll be almost dead when you arrive." It's not being harsh, it's being realistic. Dal might not look it but he is old, older than Ten, going without water for even a day might take its toll on him. Ten doesn't want another death on his hands.

Dal sees the concern in his eyes. "I'll live," he says, and deposits the canteen in one of the pockets on Minki's pack when he realizes Ten won't take hold of it.

"No, really, Dal, I can't." Ten makes a motion to get off his own horse, ready to drill some sense into the guy but Dal straightens his posture. For the first time since they have met, the authority Ten knew Dal held in him comes out.

"You can and you will," Dal says in a tone that cannot be argued with. But when has Ten ever not argued.

"You need it more than me Dal," he pushes.

"Ten," Dal says. And the force with which he says it is enough to make Ten halt. Instead of the counterargument Ten is expecting, Dal just says, "Travel safe."

He gets himself back on his own horse and turns around before Ten can fumble out a response. In his seat, reins raised, he turns back around one more time to face Ten. "Don't be afraid kid," he says. "You shouldn't fear. They should. We bury our dead in the water even when there is none."

"Are you sure you're not coming with?" Ten asks, just one last time.

"I'm afraid whoever is out there doesn't much like me. Good luck son," Dal says, and spurs his horse onwards, away from Ten, leaving him and the desert behind.

It's only once Ten has ridden up the first sand dune—the sand stretching out in front of him like a wasteland—that he realizes he had never given Dal his name.


	4. Exact Center

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Exact Center — when the sun reaches Kun Wu

Not for love or money,Hendery had said, would he willingly ride into the desert. 

_What if you had no choice Hendery_ , Ten thinks back, _what if you were offered nothing and still went._

Talking to Hendery helps pass the time, even if the response is rather dire. 

_Then you'd just be an idiot._

Dire, and more often than not discouraging. But Ten knows it's just his brain. The part of that chunk of flesh that tries to get him to turn around. It's the same part that keeps pointing out that his water is running out, bit by bit, hour by hour, that same voice whispering into his ear to turn around and follow Dal back to safety.

He tries to push the voice out of his brain, to silence it. Sometimes it works. Every minute he can rip himself away from his thoughts feels like a victory. A rather hard earned one, seeing as there is no company around for miles to distract himself with.

When he is done cussing out Hendery he turns to Minki. He has stopped asking her if she's doing alright. She isn't. He isn't. They're in it together.

Ten can't imagine coming out of this alive. And even if he does, Dejun will surely kill him for riding his horse straight into hell. But then again, if Minki gives out, Ten probably won't be far behind.

It makes him think about Dal and one of the last things the man said. _We bury our dead in water even when there is none._ It had felt out of place, much like Dal himself. The longer Ten thinks about it the more he gets stuck on the word water, which is the last place he wants his mind to wander.

If he didn’t miss his friends before he sure misses them now. He can't believe himself but he would do anything just to hear Yangyang be a brat and argue back and forth with him. Or to listen in silence as Dejun's music fills the room while he quietly sways along to the sounds his own hands produce. Three days in and Ten would do anything to have the pads of Taeyong's fingers on his skin again, the breath of Johnny in the crook of his neck, words of encouragement being whispered into his skin. 

Four days in and he confesses to Minki he would do anything to have that taste of salt cling to the air, wishes for it anytime the hint of a breeze passes by.

The suns do not help. They shine and shine and shine. If the trees were encouraging the suns are mocking. They stick out their tongue at him, deny him the cold evenings the desert usually gives.

The color of the landscape doesn't change, it's the same for miles. Every step set into the same sand, every breath puffed out into the same air. After seven days even the vibrance of the yellow can't keep Ten’s attention. His mind sways, just like his body. Minki stops.

They're on Dal's last dredges now. There is nothing more but two and a half sips in the canteen. He gives them to her, lets her drink from the bottle because they can't risk the chance of the water evaporating. He ties her loose from the final bag still strapped to her. Drops it to the ground. The brush he bought back in Gaoyang tumbles out. Ten wants to sling it away, and would, if he had the energy to.

Minki is strong, maybe she'd make it. There is no cowardice in retreat. Ten tells her this. And she should not understand but he can see in her eyes that she does. She doesn't move, doesn't try to pull Ten back with her, just stands fast in the sand under the sweltering heat of seven suns and waits for his decision.

_Something to come home to._

Ten doesn't know if it's Taeyong’s or Hendery's voice. He'd like to see them again, just for a little while. 

He grabs his bow, his arrows. Those can be ripped from his cold dead hands. He picks up the orange scraper from the ground, puts it in his left pocket, places the vial of tree sap in his right. It's a few drops lighter, happened somewhere between day seven and eight, another failed attempt.

"Strapped to the brim for war," he tries to say. It comes out as a croak. He swallows, it doesn't help, continues on anyway, "I'm banishing you to the home front."

Minki puts one hoof in front of the other, and slowly, she walks. But not in the direction Ten wants her to go.

He takes her initiative and walks into his ninth day in the desert.

On the eleventh, Minki pushes the side of her belly against his head. Ten thinks she's losing her footing, swaying on her last strength, but she does it again, hard enough to be deliberate.

She neighs when he doesn't react, does it again when she doesn't get a response. She falls into step behind him and awkwardly bumps her head against his arrow case.

"You're not carrying it," Ten says, even if the words don't come out. It's his first thought that she wants to help carry even the slightest burden. When she succeeds in grabbing one of the arrows with her mouth and tries to hand it to him, he realizes she does want to help, but in a different way than he thought. 

Ten lets himself fall. The sand easily taking him, rubbing against the fabric over his knees. He shakes his head, lets himself sit and turn his head heavenward. It burns almost as much as the heat of the sand against his palms.

He digs into the depths of himself to say, "No. I will not."

Dal must've rubbed off on her in the amount of time they spent together because Minki drops the arrow into his lap. She kicks her hoof against his knee in encouragement. As if to say that it's okay. She's made a decision, now go on. 

"Minki I will not." It comes out stronger than anything he has said in days. Minki looks taken aback, but she does not let up.

She hits his knee again, harder this time, trying to get him to stand. Ten does. He hoists himself to his feet, she is there when he stumbles, once, twice. There when he holds the arrow in his hand. She stands still as stone, waiting for the point of the arrow to cut through her skin so Ten can drink her blood. It would keep him alive for maybe another day, two if he is lucky.

Ten has never relied on luck. He throws the arrow into the sand and walks. West. Not north west, not southwest. True west. He tries to ignore Hendery's voice in the back of his mind telling him to not waste arrows like that.

They walk and do not stop. Ten is afraid if he stops now, he won't be able to start again.

The minutes bleed into hours bleed into days. At least that's what it feels like. Ten clamps his hand around the comb in his left pocket and thinks maybe a year has passed.

The desert certainly feels like the changes a year brings have passed through it. The sand looks slightly different now. It's still yellow stacked on top of yellow, but something in it is shifting, changing. It feels different under his feet, Ten knows Minki can feel it too.

Taeyong rode until the air started to feel different. Until his skin started to feel wrong. Until his sanity started to waver.

Ten has a gut feeling he has already passed the point Taeyong was talking about. Passed it long ago. Maybe even on the third day, when his own water canteen had not yet run out.

Exhausted, Taeyong had said, he and his horse had been exhausted. Ten turns his head to look over his shoulder at Minki, a few paces behind him, stumbling over her own feet with every step. Wouldn't it be fun to feel exhausted?

Getting rescued by Jungwoo and sand lions. Wouldn't that be a blast?

Ten walks. Desert west. The horizon seeming to approach him like he is approaching it. Look at me now Dejun, you at the edge of the fucking world and me at the other. 

He can remember lying to Taeyong and saying he would've headed back too. They both had known it wasn't true. 

_Something to come back to._

"Wouldn't that—" Ten yells to Minki, even if she cannot hear him, he yells as he falls. "Wouldn't that be nice, Minki."

The sand almost burns. Almost. It gets into his mouth, his nose, and even still he tries to stand. He hears a thud behind him, it sounds like the animals do when he hits them with a clean shot.

On his hands and knees he crawls. He turns his back on the west and crawls the slightest bit east towards Minki's fallen form. Ten doesn't think she's breathing. He doesn't know if he is either. 

He drops down next to her, aware and yet not of where he is. Sand is all his brain can muster up. Miles and miles of sand. 

And wings. 

_Wings. Ten. Wings._

* * *

He wakes up in a dream, his own dream, and wonders if he is dead.

There's a voice in this dream. One that at this point, after all these months, has become easily recognizable. Ten wonders if maybe death has a voice, if that's what has been whispering into his ear every single night without fail.

It would make sense. Death is older than the trees, older than the sea, older than the land. It needs a voice to beckon you onwards, a language to draw you in closer.

"Ten," it says.

It would make sense it knows his name.

"We don't have much time," it says.

Death is known to be impatient.

"Son, you can understand me right?"

Ten did not know death liked to be spoken back to, or would ever wait for confirmation.

"Yeah," Ten says, surprisingly easily. His throat doesn't strain, it doesn't feel like there are thousands of pieces of sand stuck in it rubbing against one another. "I can understand you."

After that it's easy to sit up, to breathe, to look a man in the eye that does not look like any version of death Ten had ever pictured.

Before he knows it that thought is out of his mouth. "You don't look like you want to lead me to hell."

The man looks genuinely confused before his face crosses over into amusement. "What kind of education did they give you in that palace."

Ten can't help the snort that comes out. "They tried to give me one, I was usually too busy pestering Hendery into a sword fight." A quiet laugh escapes him. "Or he was trying to pester me into eating raspberries."

"You're not fond of raspberries?"

"Of no fruit really, but I can eat it when it comes down to it." The man tilts his head to the side at Ten's response, curious. "I try not to let it come down to it." That earns him a startling laugh.

"We will alter the menu here then."

That makes Ten laugh too. "Does that mean I'm staying?"

The man turns serious in an instant. "No. Maybe in the future, but not now."

"I think it's a bit too late for a future, don't you?"

"Actually, you're right on time."

"For what?" Ten asks, and lets himself look around.

The sky is dark, if it is even a sky at all. It feels like a black void is surrounding him, light dots sprinkled in-between for contrast. Curiously, it doesn't feel like it's pressing onto his skin, like the black is trying to engulf him whole. Ten feels like he can breathe here, stand on his own.

He lets his gaze travel back to the man who is waiting patiently for him to finish looking around. "Kun," Ten says, the word, no, name, out of his mouth before he can put it back in. It makes Ten realize he has been talking in the Northern tongue all the while.

Kun's face is still stuck in a surprised expression, his mouth making a little 'o' shape. There is another word that wants to push itself out of Ten's throat. Ten doesn't know if he wants to say it as a statement or a question, so he keeps the word to himself, scared of being ridiculed no matter which option he picks.

"Ten," Kun says in return once he has regathered himself. His smile is big, so so big it's blinding. It lights up brighter than the stars in the darkness. Ten wants to put his hand up to shield himself from it, but he doesn't want to look away.

Hearing his name come from Kun's mouth leaves him feeling off balance. It sounds too familiar for it to be a first time, and besides, how does he even know?

It makes Ten think of Dal, and naturally his eyes travel to Kun's arms, looking for tattoos that aren't there. He wonders if there isn't enough light to expose them, but knows somewhere deep down that Kun doesn't have any marks on his body.

"I'm afraid the symbols are Taeil exclusive."

Ten's breath hitches, in his mind's eye he sees pictures flashing of a man with long blonde hair, smiling down at him, throwing him into the air while another voice scolds that even if the baby isn't human it can still be hurt. The photo reel warps to the present. Dal riding away from him in the desert. It hurts ten times more now that he remembers he has seen that back retreat from him once before.

Ten tries the name out on his own, like he is still that baby, trying to imitate the words of his parents.

"Taeil," he whispers to himself. Kun is crouching down in front of him, hand on his shoulder. Ten's brain is telling him to draw away from it, but his body is going against logic, leaning into the touch without hesitation. 

"You must be overwhelmed, I'm sorry." 

Ten shakes his head, both trying to say _no it's okay_ and also trying to clear his mind, to stop the pictures from flashing and just play for him in chronological order like a slideshow. His brain has never been kind to him though. It makes him draw back further into himself, he knows how bad his imagination can get. 

He places his own hand on Kun's. It feels solid. He squeezes and it doesn't fade or disappear. It stays clamped onto his shoulder, grip firm. 

Ten feels like he's going to wake up from one of his many too vivid dreams. Any moment now and then he'll feel himself tumbling down, right back into his body, awake in Johnny's bed, Taeyong's heavy form half draped over him and Ten will be too tired to push him off. Or there will be sun in his eyes because he forgot to close the curtains again and Yangyang will be kicking his shin, or his side, or he will just jump onto the bed, not caring where he lands. Hendery, Ten thinks, Hendery will be ready with badly made tea to start the day once he wakes up. 

Ten doesn't wake. He opens his eyes and the dark is still there, the stars lingering beyond it. For once his throat is not closed up, and the words fall out without flying away, "Why, what, where?" he shakes his head, gets a grip back on himself, looks Kun in his eyes and decides to settle on the last one. "Where?" he asks again.

"Somewhere in-between. Neither earth nor what lies above or below it. Somewhere in the middle."

Ten continues on with his second question. "Why?"

"Partly selfish reasons. Taeil already got to see you, I wanted to too," Kun laughs, "you're the reason we had our first conversation in two decades, and it was just to fight over who got to be by your side for a little."

"And Taeil won?"

"He had better arguments. The person you'll meet when you go back can't exactly stand the sight of me."

Ten laughs, lowly, "Da—Taeil said the same thing."

Kun chuckles. "That's just because Doyoung sees him as an extension of me, so naturally the hate carries over."

"Doyoung?" Ten tries, feeling out the name. This one does not spark any memories. "Who's that?"

At that question, Kun's face turns grim. They have a history, Ten can see that. "Mother of the suns as you humans have taken to calling him. He prefers father."

"Who's their mother then?" Ten asks, curious how the stories have warped that detail.

"There is none, but if you're wondering about the other half of the pairing, that would be me."

Ten's brows furrow together. "Still?"

Kun shakes his head with a laugh. "It has been a few centuries."

 _It's pretty hard to die in my line of work,_ Taeil had said. Ten didn't know he meant it was practically impossible.

"So, the suns..." Ten starts, trying to work out the details in his brain, "they're yours?"

"Mine and Doyoung's, yes, we shaped them, which in human terms is I guess considered as giving birth," Kun says it almost like a question.

Ten shrugs. "I wouldn't know." It draws another laugh out of Kun, and in return Ten can see that brightness again. It makes him wonder how he didn't connect the dots sooner.

"Then, Taeil," Ten stops again. _What's my mother's name?_ he had asked Taeyong when he came back from the desert. Ten had known the answer they had thought up during his life wasn't exactly right, but he didn't think there was no hint of truth to it at all.

There's too much information trying to push through and claim his attention. Every thought in his brain is screaming, _look at me! Me first!_ Ten discards them and picks a question _he_ wants to ask, something that won't make his mind explode at the answer. "What do you mean we don't have much time?" 

It feels unfair. Now that there is someone who can answer him he can't have all the time to ask. But that's life, Ten supposes, something he can't argue with.

Kun seems to fall back in his tension. His face regains that serious look, that look that says they have to hurry up.

"I might have stolen you away."

"From what?" Ten asks. "From death?"

"Don't be ridiculous, I'm afraid not even my love for you could keep you out of death's claws when the time comes," Kun says, growing more silent as his answer draws to a close. He doesn't seem heartbroken by it, and Ten realizes it must be something he has had a long time for to come to accept. Kun's head shoots up, determination in his eyes. He gives Ten a sly smile. "That doesn’t mean I won't try again though. After all, you're our only child now."

It makes Ten's body go rigid. There's an implication there, in those words. Something Kun won't come out and state because he knows it will hurt Ten. Ten can feel Kun's eyes on him, can feel him doubt. In the end Kun moves on, "I've already spoken with emperor Yao, we've both agreed you need to shoot them down."

Emperor Yao, the new emperor, took the mantle from Hendery's father and gave them a chance to start a new life. "Wait," Ten says. "How do you know him, and why do I need to shoot him down. Do you know the punishment for treason?"

Kun throws his head back to laugh, instead of the usual boisterousness Ten knows from Yukhei when he acts the same, out of Kun's throat just comes a slightly louder chuckle than the one before.

"Don't worry child, we won't have you shooting the emperor. Even if I liked Huang Di more than him, he is still a tolerable man. And an ally."

"Ally for what? The war?"

"Oh no, your father and I don't pick sides in the war. Any war, for that matter. I've noticed you and Hendery don't either."

At the mention of his name Ten's thoughts get sucked back to the present.

"I guess him and Dejun are really infatuated with one another, but if that ever changes just know me and your father would support the match."

"Kun!" Ten can't help but exclaim. "I can't think of him as anything other than a friend."

Kun nods solemnly, "That's what I said about your father too, at first, but then he started growing his hair out and—"

"I can assure you the length of Hendery's hair is not going to change if I want to fuck him or not."

Kun looks scandalized. "I will have a word or two with Huang Di about your upbringing. Where did you learn to swear like that."

"Hendery," Ten says with a grin, pleased at the way Kun's mouth drops open. Ten's eyes turn serious. He straightens his back, squares his shoulders, readies himself for a blow. "Is he alive?"

Kun takes a second but eventually he nods and Ten's body sinks into itself with relief. "I asked Doyoung to keep him alive in return for him to get a chance to talk to you."

"Why does he want that?"

"He knows the suns have to be taken down, but he wants to talk to you first before you head off."

"You want me to shoot _them_ down?" 

Kun nods again, once, quick. "Yes." He opens his mouth, clamps it shut again, like a fish on dry land. "Please, be gentle with them, if you can. Don't make it hurt. Don't let them suffer." 

_They're his children too,_ Ten is reminded, _and yet he is giving me the go ahead._ It reminds him he has been staying away from cities as much as possible ever since he left the east. It's mostly been him and Minki, and for a little while also Taeil.

"How much worse has it gotten?" 

Kun draws his hand back from Ten's shoulder to grip his own knee. "The dying crops and drying rivers aren't even the worst." He looks away from Ten, eyes pointing down to the ground. "Monsters have risen with the suns, they too, won't rest."

"I'm guessing they are worse than venomous spiders."

"Much, much worse. Lest to speak off—" Kun abruptly cuts himself off. The grip on his knee tightens. He raises his eyes but not to Ten. Kun looks to his right, as if there is something other than dark and stars and says, "Some of them haven't risen yet, but they won't be asleep for much longer."

 _Trolls,_ Ten's mind supplies, and he is reminded of the sparkle in Dejun's eyes when he found out they existed.

"If you want to get a good shot you best get there before they break out of the ice."

"You want me to go north," and as Ten says it, he realizes why. The Widow’s Trail as he has dubbed it in his mind, Kun wants him to walk that to get to the highest place on earth, somewhere where it is said you can touch heaven if you have long arms and enough courage. 

"Preferably with no help from the beasts in the north," Kun says, a sudden snarl appearing in his tone. "Not that you would have a problem with their help," Kun adds under his breath. It is then that he withdraws from Ten, just slightly, but enough for it to feel definite. 

"You never listened to my advice about staying away from them when you were young, why would you now." Kun's lips try to quirk up in a smile, but it's a losing battle. 

Ten can feel a soft breeze touch his skin, he turns around to look where it supposedly came from, but there is no noise to indicate anything. Then it's back again, poking him in his arm. And then harder, in his side. It reminds him of Yangyang kicking him every fifth day if he took too long to wake on his own.

"Doyoung is tired of waiting," Kun explains. "And he's right, I've held you for too long already."

Another blow to his side, this one even harder. Ten touches the spot and thinks it might leave a bruise.

"But," he starts, "I have questions. How am I supposed to shoot all of them down? Can't they attack me back? What if the trolls are awake by then, and the giants, how would I even get past the giants? Are you going to help? Taeil? Why isn't Taeil here? What do the marks on his arms mean, do they correlate with the water?" Ten stops his gush of questions to take a breath. "Tern," he says, "why won't she leave me alone."

Kun doesn't yield to the desperation in his voice. He lets the world around them crumble, lets the dark engulf the light and break open to reveal sky.

"When you die," Kun says, and his voice feels far away now, booming not into the space but only into Ten's ears, "ask them to burn your body, just putting you in the earth won't do any good."

Ten falls through the dark, further and further down and away from Kun until there is only light around him again. He falls back into his body, his consciousness, and opens his eyes to ones that do, in fact, look like hell. 

* * *

It must run in the family, being disliked by Doyoung. Almost like it's a requirement to be met before you are even born. Wanted: people and creatures alike that the father of the suns— Doyoung, not the other one—holds a grudge against without any proper reasoning. Others need not apply. 

Ten doesn’t remember signing the contract, but maybe someone had faked his signature. Gods know the gods themselves would not be above doing that. 

As much as Doyoung can look at him nastily though—and apparently put a lot of force behind his kicks because yes that spot was _definitely_ going to bruise—there is a much more pressing matter. 

When Jungwoo had written to him proclaiming Hendery to be missing, presumed dead, Ten had expected to find his dehydrated body buried beneath sand, lips chapped and skin equally wrinkled, if he would even find the body at all. What he had not expected was for Hendery’s skin to shine, and neither for his body to be shaded by a wing. 

As soon as he can stand, he runs. 

Ten does not care that he is running to the biggest creature he has ever seen, that the creature can probably burn him in under three seconds flat. The only thing he cares about is that he feels a pulse when he presses his fingers to Hendery’s neck. 

He wants to sob with relief, but the tears don’t come out. 

He cradles Hendery’s body though, lets himself fall over it, hiding it from the outside world, relief in every exhale. His eyes travel towards the wing above them, and Ten would be thankful for the shade for the first time in days, if he could stop and look away. 

His eyes are tracing the muscles that are spread out over the black wing. The color on the inside of it is lighter than on the outside, like Ten’s own hands. Beneath the muscles must be the bones, four of them large and stretched from top to bottom. It might seem delicate when you think about the four twig bones keeping it together, but the sheer size of the wing completely washes away any thought of fragility. 

Ten wonders for a brief moment if his arrow could pierce through, and for the first time since he picked up a bow at age eight he finds himself doubting his answer. It reminds him of the material out of which his arrows consist and he can’t help but crouch down lower over Hendery’s body, just to be sure he will be hit first if the dragon lashes out. 

His eyes travel to its neck, and in association, the scales. They gleam in the light and Ten can’t help but think of Taeil’s marks, although this is something entirely different. The scales get darker and darker the further they travel away from the throat, until they are as pitch black as the dark he just fell from. 

It’s then that the neck he has been staring at shifts and curls, the scales moving as a head appears. The chin is smooth, or as smooth as it can be. On the side of the head there rest gills, one gill on each side. 

They spread open and reveal the same four bone structure as the wings have, only on a smaller scale. It has some resemblance to a fish, but it makes Ten think even more of the women that would sometimes enter the palace, dressed in beautiful dresses that would fall all the way to the floor, often decorated with flowers and saplings that were stitched into the material like they belonged there. The women would sometimes wear masks, but they would always carry fans, and with it they would dance. Ten remembers one of them being able to jump over the others in a cartwheel without using her hands. 

Ten had gone back to his room one evening and tried to mimic the move, resulting in him almost landing with his neck at a weird angle. He hadn't tried again. 

The details in the gills are even more beautiful than the dresses of the women had been. There is a color difference, the closer to the face the darker the black. It’s slight, but it’s there. 

Next, Ten’s eyes find the dragon’s own and he can feel his body want to react and lean back, press further to the ground. Running is not an option. Instead, he draws forward, further into that gaze. 

It engulfs him whole. Ten feels like he’s being burnt alive. He doesn’t want to look away. The red eyes make his mouth dry up. It’s hotter than the heat of the seven suns he has been travelling under. Compared to this, that was nothing, just an appetizer. 

Ten looks beyond the questioning face—because that’s what it’s doing, Ten realizes, tilting its head as it tries to work him out—at Minki. She’s lying down but her eyes are open, the crust from them gone and Ten wonders what Doyoung did to make her look more alive than he has seen her ever since they rode into the desert. Hell, ever since they rode west. 

She’s wary, looking at the dragon like she doesn’t trust it. When she looks at Ten she makes a move to stand, keeping her eyes on the gleaming scales all the while as she draws closer until she hovers over Ten and Hendery. _Protecting them,_ Ten realizes and wonders what he has done in his life to deserve her. 

“Done?” comes a voice in a tone Ten wants to hate on instinct. 

He lets his eyes rake over Hendery once more before looking at Doyoung. 

“Maybe a thank you?” he says, laughing at his own suggestion. “But that might be a little hopeful from people like you, wouldn’t it?” 

As Doyoung comes closer Ten can feel Minki hover lower over him, eyes sharp and pointed at the god. 

Because that’s what Doyoung is: a god. It’s in the way he moves, almost like he’s gliding over the sand instead of walking on it. He has the same look in his eyes as Taeil did, minus the softness. Ten wonders how long Doyoung has lived to carry around an expression like that. Or maybe his face only started to rest like this recently, since the suns rose. It reminds Ten that for all Doyoung can insult him, he needs something from Ten. Two things, actually. 

He needs Ten to take the suns down, and do it carefully while he’s at it. _Gently,_ Kun had said, _don’t let them suffer,_ he had asked. Ten wonders what kind of logic goes behind being a gentle killer. 

“I think we need to negotiate,” Doyoung says. It doesn’t sound like a question, or something that can be argued with. Doyoung is probably used to getting what he wants. It’s a thought Ten can’t stand. 

Doyoung draws even closer, until he is also under the shade of the wing and directly in front of Ten. He keeps a few paces distance though, probably because Minki flares her nostrils every time he wants to take another step. 

“You need to shoot only six out of seven suns,” Doyoung begins, laying out his master plan, “so I want the one you spare to be the third sun. Sun Jeno.” 

“Why?” Ten asks but deep down he knows the answer. Parents pick favorites. It makes him wonder if he is Kun or Taeil’s favorite, or maybe neither’s. 

Doyoung cocks his head to the side. It reminds Ten awfully of a bird. The myths talk of seven suns being carried by seven crows across the horizon. _Between the sand and the cawing of crows, there lies the answer._ Ten looks at Doyoung’s black button like eyes, and thinks Taeyong might’ve been right with this one. 

Instead of giving Ten an answer, Doyoung just waits. The dragon around them shifts at the tension in the air, Ten notices it does not shift towards Doyoung. 

“Fine,” he says in the end. “We need some source of light after all.” The joke falls flatter than Doyoung’s expression. 

“I’ll be taking him then,” Doyoung says, nodding towards the body Ten is still crouching over. 

Ten’s body stiffens. He tries to search for the weight of his quiver against his back but it’s not there. He has never regretted not having his bow in his hand more than in this moment. Not even when he was caught in a surprise attack in the Mao fields and it was three against one. 

“It’s there,” Doyoung says, this time giving a quick nod to somewhere behind him. “Now, the boy.” He isn’t even looking at Ten, staring up into the sky like he can’t be bothered to drag this conversation out. 

There are a lot of things Ten will do in this world, handing Hendery over to a god that’s high on his own power trip is not one of them. “He’s coming with me.” 

Doyoung rolls his eyes heavenwards. “You really think I trust you to actually fulfill my request?” 

“You really think I trust you to know how to care for humans?” 

“He’s still alive, isn’t he,” Doyoung snarls. “And look at yourself, your horse, you call that dead?” 

Ten swallow his arguments back down. He considers his options and is reminded once again that he won’t make it very far if he runs. Although he has a feeling the dragon won’t come after him, Doyoung himself will still be faster, especially if he has to carry Hendery. 

“How about this,” Ten starts, getting interrupted by Doyoung halfway through. 

“When I said negotiate I didn’t actually mean it.” 

Ten tries again, “How about I take Hendery, and if I fail in fulfilling my task you can take me instead.” 

“You really think I want to spend more time with the likes of you. Your father is already bad enough, I don’t want to have to mingle with his bastard offspring either.” 

“I’m not a bastard.” 

“Compare yourself to his other children and you might find yourself coming up short. The suns that give us warmth pitted against a reckless child with a bow.” Doyoung’s eyes darken with mirth. “Not to speak of your rotten sister. Tell me, how long did she live before you stuck an arrow through her throat. Do you see it play before you when you sleep? Does she haunt your dreams because you didn’t bury her right?” 

Doyoung’s laughter is like nails on a chalkboard when he realizes he has hit the nail on the head. Ten is afraid his eardrums might start to bleed. He reaches up to cover his ears against the sound, and only realizes the mistake he has made when it’s already been done. 

The tail comes out of nowhere, wrapping itself around Hendery’s body and dragging him away from Ten faster than the speed of light. Ten crawls after it, falling over himself and landing strewn out into the sand when he misses the grab for Hendery’s ankle. 

The dragon deposits the body in front of Doyoung’s feet like a cat would a mouse to its owner. Like Hendery is a prize. Doyoung grins. 

“Now that that’s settled, get your toy and leave.” 

Ten pushes himself to his feet. He won’t give up Hendery that easily. “Why can’t you just take my word,” he asks, venom dripping from his voice in increments. 

“You have your father to thank for that.” 

Doyoung let’s him walk to his bow, let’s him strap on his quiver, let’s him pull out an arrow and point it at Doyoung’s forehead. 

“If you let the string go I’ll make sure that arrow lands in your friend and not me.” There is a glint in Doyoung’s eye. “Pulling an arrow on a god, how stupid do you have to be.” 

There is a fine line between bravery and stupidity, Ten likes to think he is currently still straying on the edge of being brave. 

“I have never missed a shot in my life.” He squares his shoulders, lets his muscles relax one by one. He can feel the soft breeze, can hear it if he strains his ears hard enough. “Not even on moving prey.” 

Doyoung’s eyes widen in anger. Ten doesn't let himself laugh, doesn't let himself have the small victory. 

“My dragon will have your head before you can pull another one.” 

Ten eyes the dragon who has its eyes trained on him, tracking his every movement, every tilt of his body. 

“I don’t care.” Out of the two of them, Taeyong has always been the one with a death wish, that doesn’t mean Ten can’t fake his own. “I’ll pull him into death right beside me.” 

“You talk a lot for a boy who’s arrows won’t even pierce my flesh.” 

It’s a last resort and a fluke, Ten knows this, can taste the desperation behind Doyoung’s words. He pulls the string further back. Minki can drag Hendery’s body back to safety, maybe. She will try, Ten knows that. She will come back to guide Yukhei and Jungwoo to his dead body. She won’t let him rot away in the sand. He wants to hate her for it, for doing so much, but gratitude is the only thing he can feel. 

He lets his eyes drift towards her. She’s made her way out from under the wing, standing ready to bolt not to Ten but to Hendery. She dips her head, once, almost like a nod. Ten is reminded that she really shouldn’t be this smart, this attuned to him. 

He points his eyes back at Doyoung, draws the string back fully and almost let’s go when Doyoung yells, “Wait!” 

Ten doesn’t respond. He keeps his bow raised. Doyoung might have Hendery’s body but Ten still holds some cards. 

“We will trade,” Doyoung says in a rush, “your boy for my dragon, see it as collateral.” 

“How will I know he won’t fly away as soon as I turn my back.” 

Doyoung raises his hand and snaps his fingers, from the corner of Ten’s left eye he can see the sand move. He feels air hit him, harder than the gentle breezes he has been privileged to feel while riding over sand dunes. The force of the wind almost knocks him off his feet but he stays planted in the sand, arrow trained on Doyoung’s head. 

“Look,” Doyoung says, gesturing with his hand to his right. Ten swings his bow with him and looks. 

His arrow is now trained on the head of a boy around his height with the same black hair as the darkest scales the dragon bore. The eyes, though, are again what make Ten want to take a step back. When the light hits them just right, the red shines through the brown. They don’t look afraid. 

“How do I know he won’t run away as soon as I turn my back,” Ten asks, rougher this time. 

He doesn't have to look to see the smirk with which Doyoung speaks. “You’ll just have to trust me on my word.” 

* * *

It only takes a couple paces on Ten’s part for Doyoung to move out of sight, but not out of mind. It’s like as he moves backwards the land shifts with him, pushing him out and away. Minki is quick to follow, galloping through the barrier to Ten who still has his bow strung, never having lost sight of the dragon who follows him in his retreat. 

Ten urges the boy to walk in front of him once he knows for sure that they are alone and have left that placebehind. He can see the amusement on the boy’s face triple. The human form of the dragon doesn’t speak though, just turns his back to Ten and walks north. 

“South,” Ten says once he realizes the plan. The boy stops in his tracks before him, turns around to look at him confused. 

“South-east actually, but more south than east. We can’t just walk into the true north anyway.” The boy looks at him like he very much disagrees. “There are people waiting for me in the south,” Ten explains, “I need to get to them first.” 

The boy just turns a little more than a quarter into the direction Ten spoke of and starts to walk again. He doesn’t speak. 

Ten starts to think maybe he can’t. But at the same time it walks like a human, it behaves like a human, it looks like a human, who is to say it can’t talk like one as well. 

They make it two miles before Minki starts nosing at his shoulder. Ten knows what she means. He doesn’t know where they are or how far they still need to go. What he does know is if they ride they might make it out. On foot they will not. At least not him and Minki. Ten can’t speak for the dragon. 

“Stop!” Ten tells the boy. He let’s the strung arrow relax in his grip and lowers his bow for the first time in two miles. “We’re going to have to ride.” 

Ten slings his bow over his shoulder with hesitation, but in the end decides to do it just so he can swing himself onto Minki. All the while, the dragon is looking at him with glee, like he had expected Ten would give up sooner rather than later. 

“You can hold an arrow against my throat if it makes you feel more comfortable,” the boy says as he settles in front of Ten. He talks in human tongue, but it’s a little rough around the edges. Something sharp peeking through the syllables. 

“I’m good,” Ten responds, mulling over if he should trust the boy with the reins since apparently he knows where to steer them. 

“You sure?” 

Something about the casualty of the response rubs Ten the wrong way. The boy isn’t afraid of him, Ten realizes, not afraid at all. 

“Are you going to run?” Ten asks. 

The response the boy gives makes Ten pause. “I haven’t decided yet.” He hadn’t expected such honesty, is more used to people sugarcoating and dancing around truths. It’s refreshing, for a change. It also reminds him of Hendery, who, besides always being honest with him, would also not be afraid to call out Ten’s stupidity. 

Ten gives the dragon the reins and, in the back of his mind, he can feel Hendery rise at the opportunity for a scolding. He shuts it down and urges Minki forward. She moves at first with hesitation, but when after an hour the boy hasn’t pushed Ten off she relaxes under them. 

“She harbors a lot of trust for you,” the boy points out soon after. Ten can’t determine if he’s curious or amused. Maybe both.

“It’s mutual.” 

“Relationships like that are never mutual.” 

Ten wants to retort but he holds himself back. It makes him think though, think of the way the dragon hadn’t shifted towards Doyoung when he’d come closer. 

It’s the last conversation they have for a while. Ten doesn’t know where they came from but he knows in the excess space in the desert there is a spot where the suns land once they have set. And he had been in that space, had stood on it, almost died in it. Almost shot a god in it. 

It seems like flattery to think Doyoung had just been waiting for him to come. Maybe he was still holding out hope the suns would give in and set. Ten mulls the possibilities over as they ride. Would Doyoung stay now that the order had been given? Or would he leave? But to where? 

Ten knows just like in the west there is a place in the east where the suns take off. A little island with a tree from behind which they rise. He wonders if it has the same concept as the space in the desert. How long, Ten thinks, how long would you have to sail to reach it, if you could even reach it at all. 

Time seems like an illusion. It had felt like Ten had been walking towards the horizon for years before he finally fell down, but now it takes less than a day until they reach inhabited territory. Ten wonders if it was just his bad sense of direction that resulted in him getting lost, but deep down in his guts he knows that not to be the truth.

They ride in silence until they see the first sand lions. The lions move around them with a wide breadth, careful to keep their distance. They’re known for being scared animals, but something about their haste makes Ten think it’s not just their nature that’s making them stray away from the three of them. 

“The Ba tribe shouldn’t be far off,” Ten informs. “We have to ask directions from the first ones we see though, they’re split into little clusters who move around.” 

“Don’t tell them what I am,” the boy tells Ten. 

“Why?”

“It’s better for both of us if you don’t.” 

“What am I supposed to say then? That I picked a boy with red eyes up in the middle of the desert?” Ten laughs at the absurdity of it. “That you were trying to catch a ride?” 

“Am I riding with you on your horse or not?” 

“Yes but—” 

“Promise it,” Sicheng pushes. “Promise you won’t rat me out.” 

“Okay,” Ten says hesitantly. When he notices the boy is far from satisfied he adds, “I promise.” 

“Sicheng, by the way.” 

“What?” 

“You picked up Sicheng with the red eyes who was trying to hitch a ride. And there you were, my knight in shining armor, protecting me from danger,” Sicheng turns around as he says it. The grin he wears triggers Ten’s fight or flight instinct. It makes him want to dig into the sand like the lions do when they’re scared. But fear is not something he entertains. Not while awake. So he grins back, putting his own teeth on display. 

Ten finally remembers what those eyes remind him of. It's the calm before the storm. The moment when he knows there are people hidden in the plains that are ready to jump him, and he won’t get out of it without bloodshed. It makes Ten feel like he is not the hunter, but the prey. 


	5. Late Morning Meal

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Late Morning Meal — when the sun reaches the Steaming Spring

Yukhei is conscious.

Three hard slaps on Ten’s back, and then he’s being held at arm's length, being stared at like he can’t believe Ten is alive while it was Yukhei that was in a coma not long ago. More thumping on his back by a hand that engulfs his entire shoulder blade. Yukhei is conscious alright.

Yukhei’s hands squeezes at his shoulders while he looks around Ten to Sicheng. He raises an eyebrow to Ten with a knowing smile. “Is this Taeyong?” he asks, loud enough for Sicheng to hear too. 

Ten and Jungwoo both say no at the same moment. It makes Ten look at Jungwoo and he can see it, can see all the descriptions Yukhei has given him over the years reflect off of the boy. And yet they still don’t do him enough justice. Even with his hair tousled, his clothes rumpled, and his face edged with worry, Jungwoo looks stunning.

 _An angel amongst man,_ Yukhei had once said before he had leant in closer to Ten, his alcohol indulged breath tickling Ten's ear at his next careful words, _maybe even amongst gods._ He had then leant back and held up his hand to call the barkeeper over for another drink. _But don't tell him that we're currently supposed to be fighting._

Jungwoo hugs him too, just as hard as Yukhei had. It makes Ten remember he knows this guy's favorite foods and exactly how long he stays upset when Yukhei sells a horse for a too cheap price. It makes him remember Jungwoo sent for him when he needed help, makes him remember the letter in rushed handwriting that he did get to read.

"Nice to finally meet you," Ten says when Jungwoo steps back, a flush on his cheeks as embarrassment catches up with him.

"You too." Jungwoo's voice is quiet, almost serene. It's like the tide drawing in, waiting to wash back onto the sand. The smile Jungwoo gives him is equally as soft. In this light his eyes shine a bright blue, almost beating out Sicheng's eyes for the biggest miracle on earth. What catches Ten attention the most though, is the tattoo.

When Yangyang took him to sail they met a captain. The same captain with the eyepatch he told Taeil about. The one with lines spiraling out from his eye socket. 

The face tattoo Jungwoo bears is different. It fits onto his face perfectly like the captain's tattoo, traveling alongside the left side of his face and accentuating every shape, outlining even the sharp cut of his jaw.

Even if Jungwoo is Ba tribe, his mark does not resemble the ones you see his other tribe members wear at all. It's not like the sharp black lines on Yukhei's shoulders and back, not at all like the big piece that adorns his back. No, it's like the sailors who's tattoos are only visible once they catch the light just right. It's like Taeil's. But whereas Taeil's had been symbols and the captain's had been spirals, Jungwoo's look like scales.

He's caught staring again, and this time he is called out on it. "You're staring," Jungwoo says with a chuckle.

"You wouldn't believe how often that has happened recently," Ten says.

"Why don't you tell us about it inside," Yukhei proposes, swinging an arm over Ten's shoulder and already guiding him towards a tent before waiting for an answer. Jungwoo and Sicheng fall into step behind them. Ten hears Jungwoo ask for Sicheng's name but he doesn't concentrate on the rest of the conversation. Despite the warmth, he presses further into Yukhei's side, lets himself inhale the scent he can easily place.

The first human contact after gods know how long, because surely a dragon hidden in a human's body doesn't count.

When the first sun didn't set and the second sun rose, whispers had already started, when half an hour later the third sun followed, a notion was put out for all the Ba tribe to gather together.

They stationed themselves against the border of the Mainland where the sand is almost nonexistent and the Hanshui river not even an hours hard ride away. It has been an uncomfortable change for most of the people gathered, Yukhei explains, his folk aren't used to sticking around in one place, especially not with this large a group. But in a crisis like this, it is necessary, for they are better organized and stronger together than divided.

Jungwoo explains how they had sent search troops back to where Yukhei and his group of explorers had gotten hit, and when that brought nothing, had sent some of the braver souls that know how to ride sand lions further into the desert. All returned after an hour, saying they surely had been away for at least a day.

"Time in the desert has always been weird," Jungwoo says, "it doesn't help that you can't keep track of days anymore either."

Apparently, two of the vials of plum tree sap had arrived. "The note included with it said something about three drops, six if it was really bad." Jungwoo scratches the back of his head, avoiding eye contact with Ten. "I might have forced half of vial into Yukhei's bloodstream."

Ten laughs at the admission. Sicheng is next to him, eyeing Yukhei curiously.

"Luckily it worked like a charm," Yukhei says with a grin. "Woke me up like that." He snaps his fingers to enunciate his point.

Jungwoo nods in agreement. "Healed his cuts and bruises too. Magic in a bottle is what the people that were there have taken to calling it. Although it didn't work on anyone else."

Ten remembers forcing a bit of the stuff down his and Minki's throat once the water ran out. It hadn't worked on either of them. He tells them so.

"It's because you don't have giant's blood," Sicheng says, eyes sharp not on Ten but Jungwoo as he speaks.

"Sorry, I didn't catch your name," Yukhei says.

"I already introduced myself earlier." 

"Please repeat it," Jungwoo encourages. 

"Sicheng." The two syllables slide off his tongue like venom. For a brief second Ten wonders if Sicheng sticks out his tongue, maybe it would be split in two, it's the same species after all, at least that's what the books Jaehyun sometimes brought over say. 

"And..." Yukhei pauses to decide how to phrase his question. "How exactly did you two meet?"

Jungwoo tunes in. "I'm actually pretty curious about that myself." 

Ten imagines this is what it must be like to bring over a partner to introduce to your parents for them to be grilled. Only difference here is that Sicheng is everything but human, or his partner, although it would be easier if at least one of the two were true. 

"Ten was kind enough to give me a ride." 

"We met in Yan Di," Ten explains, and the lies come easily. He just changes up the timeline a little, switches out one stranger for another. "Sicheng has to go east and no one would take him because of the suns. I said he could come along but that we had to stop here first. He agreed if only to escape the rotten food in that tavern." 

Sicheng nods along throughout the explanation. "Ale wasn't to drink for shit either," he adds solemnly. "I was just considering quitting drinking all together when he showed up." Sicheng nudges Ten in his side like they're friends and he isn't here as an exchange for half dead Hendery. 

They fall into the spiel easily. Sicheng taking the liberty to complain at length about Ten's pick for riding song which naturally has Yukhei joining in with his own takes on what exactly makes a good song for a journey. As the two go off, Jungwoo looks at him with eyes that say he doesn't believe a single word that has come out of either Sicheng or Ten's mouth, yet he doesn't comment on it, just watches with a fond smile as Yukhei gets heated when Sicheng says the songs from the south are a bit bland. 

Ten is reminded again of the desperation in the letter Jungwoo sent him. The fear that Yukhei would not wake up. It hurts. What hurts even more is that he doesn't have to imagine how Jungwoo must have felt, he himself knows it all too well. 

* * *

As they turn in for the night, Yukhei hands him a letter. It's unopened, waxed shut with an official seal. He has never seen its true red colors in person, or the imprint, has only heard about it from Hendery when his father put him on sealing duty.

He opens the letter even if his hands want to shake. The last time he had opened a letter it had not brought him good news. Ten can't deny he is feeling nervous.

Sicheng is in front of him on the ground, setting up two bedrolls for them to sleep on. Yukhei and Jungwoo were kind enough to let them stay in the tent they sleep in. It will be a tight fit once the bedding has been made but it's doable. Probably still better than sleeping out under the suns.

Ten opens the letter and can't help the sliver of relief that courses through his body at the neat handwriting. It's an invitation he realizes after the second sentence. An invitation leaning more towards a summoning.

"What's it say?" Sicheng asks, trying to get the end of a bedroll to keep from sticking up. It's a losing battle.

Ten gives him a look but doesn't hesitate further to share the contents of the letter. "Emperor Yao wants me to come to the palace. Probably so he can officially instruct me to shoot the suns from the sky." Ten can't help but tag on, "Do you think he has a favorite he wants me to keep alive?"

Sicheng stills in his movement, and then his shoulders begin to shake. Ten only belatedly realizes it's because he's laughing. "I'll pay you good money if you shoot the sun Jeno first."

"And where would a dragon even get money? I think I'm the one that's going to pay to keep you fed."

Sicheng looks up at him with glee. "You haven't heard? Dragons are supposedly known for guarding treasure. I didn't think you were this behind with the times." 

Ten can't help but let out a chuckle. "Give me a break, I just came back from some place in between space and time." 

"And I just got put into my human form against my will so who has it worse now huh." 

"Is it that bad?" 

Sicheng shrugs and goes back to trying to flatten out the bedroll. "It feels weird every time to make the switch, doesn't hurt though." 

"You switch a lot?" 

"Almost every day, it was easier to talk to the suns that way. Especially Jisung never really grew out of his fear for my dragon form." 

Ten takes the answer into account. "You talked to them?" 

"You really think I drag them back to the east every night only to never exchange a word with them? Please. Doyoung isn't much for small talk so eventually you just give in." 

Ten sits down so he reaches Sicheng's eye level. The curiosity in his voice shines through when he asks his question, "So you only drag them across the sky at night, not during the day?" 

"We wait for each of them to come down each day and then we head east. Some process day in day out, it gets a bit boring after a while." 

Ten pushes. "But the legends say you carried them during the day as well." 

Sicheng's voice turns cold, not eager to share anymore. "Once they were fully grown Doyoung made it very clear that wasn't my task anymore."

"And you do all of it alone? The myths say—"

"Shut up," Sicheng says. Ten clamps his mouth shut in an instant. "You shouldn't believe everything the myths say. You'd think the son of the sun and moon would know better."

It's the first time someone else has addressed it, spoken about it so openly and freely. It doesn't stir the pride in his stomach Ten would have expected. He doesn't feel much of anything, except for the ever lingering confusion that seems to have followed him back to earth.

"There is a lot I don't remember," Ten tries to explain. "I couldn't speak our language properly until a month ago."

"Our?" Sicheng questions, his eyes squeezed in consideration.

"The gods' language," Ten says, "the northern tongue," he elaborates when Sicheng's brows furrow even further.

"Northern it is alright," Sicheng agrees. "But it's far from yours."

Ten is about to ask what he means by that but Sicheng swiftly moves on from the topic. "Are you going to the emperor?"

He keeps looking at Ten thoughtfully as Ten goes over the pros and cons in his mind. The palace lies in the northwest, close to the yellow river. They could stop at the cabin on the way for extra supplies. But what exactly would he gain by riding to the palace? He has all the information he needs, has an angry god that's expecting something of him, two other gods that are expecting the same thing but in a more encouraging way, and a dragon he has to take with him across the land.

And besides, when Ten walked with Hendery through those palace walls, he wasn't ever expecting to return. He isn't eagerto return either. It would only cause delay, because after traveling to the palace they would still need to go east.

If walking into the desert is stupid, walking into the north without a proper guide is akin to ritual suicide. And besides, the ice caps are melting, trolls are close to waking, they don't have time to visit the emperor for a cup of tea.

"No," Ten says eventually. "We're going east."

"Are you running?" Sicheng asks, amused.

"It's actually quite the opposite." Ten thinks of the person who helped him regain back his footing in the northern tongue. "We're going to the only person that can actually get us into the north."

Sicheng tilts his head considering. "You know a lot of people."

Ten shrugs, moving to stand and search for Yukhei to relay the plan to. "It comes with the job."

He doesn't find Yukhei, but Jungwoo, waiting for him like he expected Ten to come to them sooner rather than later. 

When Ten asks where Yukhei is, Jungwoo bites his lip in hesitation to answer. A second later Ten hears a retching sound not far away. 

"Is that?" 

"Yes," Jungwoo answers. "Being brought back from the brink of death left an impact. Or maybe it's because I threw half of the bottle into him." 

Jungwoo looks like he blames himself and only himself so Ten says, "It's not your fault. It's because of you that he's even conscious at all."

"Yeah, but at what cost."

"I think it's a price worth paying. And I can have a guess Yukhei thinks so too."

Jungwoo looks away from him, back to the sound of someone trying very hard to keep the insides of their stomach inside. "He wouldn't let me go when he woke up. Just clutched my arm for forty minutes, battling sleep while saying he didn't want to leave me again." 

"He loves you," Ten states, because it's been obvious ever since the day he first met Yukhei. 

Jungwoo laughs quietly to himself, like that pleasure is just for him. "He said that too, when he awoke a second time." Jungwoo sighs, but the look in his eyes is fond. "Only took him years."

"Wait you knew?"

"Do you think I'm an idiot?"

Ten groans up at the sky. "Do you know how many letters I received in which he spilled his entire heart, going on tangents with bad prose about how he thought it was unrequited because surely you must have made a move by now if it wasn't."

"I wanted to be sure it wasn't just puppy love, I care too much about him to abandon him if he eventually broke my heart because he got bored."

"You're so fucking dense."

Jungwoo's eyes crinkle in amusement. "How's Taeyong?" His eyes turn serious, flitting back to the tent in which Sicheng is probably still struggling with that bed roll. "Or have you broken it off."

"He had a man waiting for him when we got to the east." Jungwoo's eyes widen. Ten is quick to mend. "The man invited me into bed with them. And then into their home." 

"Sounds like he has his heart in the right place." 

"Oh that's Johnny alright. He has taken in three orphans, one of them is already calling him dad." It's easy to talk to Jungwoo about the twins, about Yangyang. When Yukhei emerges from behind the building, still wiping at his mouth but pretending he is otherwise alright, he searches for a glass of water before joining in to listen to Ten. 

He tells them about Yangyang's inability to stay quiet during a hunt, about Dejun's new instrument, Ten's speculations that he has stayed east and grown his beard out. He tells them about Johnny and his customers, the way Taeyong shines as he walks the streets. By the time he gets to the flower fields Sicheng has joined them. 

He's in the middle of saying he should really check on Minki when Yukhei interrupts him. "I had been meaning to ask," he says with wonder, "how the hell did you manage to get hold of my horse." 

Ten stops in the middle of rising from the log he was sitting on. "Yours?" 

"Mine alright. I don't forget a horse like that." 

Jungwoo's expression has already turned sour. "She's not yours," he says, patting Yukhei's arm. "He lost her in a game of crabs." 

Sicheng laughs, long and loud. "I can already imagine how that conversation went." 

"We had a talk," Jungwoo agrees, "a long and hard one." As the two of them jump into the risks of gambling and just, exactly, how intoxicated you have to be to bet your own horse which was your only mode of transportation into the city in the first place Yukhei leans across the table towards Ten, eyebrow raised. 

"You lost her to a friend of mine," Ten says. "Dejun." 

"The Viet who travelled east with you?" Ten nods, glad Yukhei remembered. "Well, if I had to lose her to someone I suppose he was a good person to pick." 

"He said you couldn't ride for shit." 

Yukhei's voice rises in an instant. "He said what now." Halfway through he seems to reconsider and draws back into himself. "I can only ride sand lions when drunk, horses are not my forte." He buries his head into his hands. "I really made a fool of myself that night."

Jungwoo pats him on the back in an attempt at comfort. "It's fine, it's just one horse. Best we had but just one nonetheless."

"Maybe just one horse but that night bruised my pride for a decade." He sulks into Jungwoo's side who easily wraps an arm around him.

"He should come see me ride in the tournaments when all this has cleared up."

"Tournaments?" Sicheng questions. Yukhei is all too quick to jump into an explanation of the yearly sand lion tournaments. To Ten's surprise, Sicheng listens with an attentive ear, even chimes in every once in a while with a well posed question.

"I think Dejun would have a heart attack if he came along for the next one," Ten says. "He doesn't exactly know your alias."

Yukhei waves it away. "That's fine, not many people do."

"No," Ten starts, "I mean when he finds out you're also Xuxi, acclaimed sand lion rider he might actually die of embarrassment when he realizes he called you a bad rider."

"I'd pay to see that," Jungwoo says.

Sicheng nods along. "Sounds like a good afternoon of entertainment."

Ten groans. "Don't side with him," he tells Sicheng.

Sicheng turns to Jungwoo. "Have room for one more on those lions? I'm kinda over his entire martyr spiel," he says, pointing a thumb at Ten.

"Asshole."

"Idiot," Sicheng counters easily.

Jungwoo eventually breaks it up with a smile. "I'm afraid we're not coming with you guys. We can't just abandon our people, not at times like these."

Yukhei hums in agreement, looking around the camp like it still has miles of improvement ahead of it, and he wouldn't be wrong.

"That's okay," Ten says. "I understand."

"Thanks," Yukhei responds, genuine, like it had been eating at him that he couldn't ride with Ten to complete his journey. It probably had.

In return, Ten offers, “I’m sorry I couldn’t be there when you woke up.” He does feel guilty about it, truly wanted to be there when Yukhei had first awoken. But Yukhei had Jungwoo, his tribe, Hendery was all out alone in the desert. 

“Ten, it’s fine, you don’t have to apologize for that,” Yukhei says with sad eyes. “Did you…” he trails off, not wanting to voice the question. 

Him and Sicheng hadn’t talked about this, and Ten remembers his promise, but this is Yukhei. Yukhei who calls Hendery _Hennie_ and stops by when he can just because he misses them. Ten wants to lie, needs to lie, but he can’t help but incorporate a hint of the truth. He is careful to not look at Sicheng for confirmation when he explains that Hendery was taken by a god, one who wants Ten to travel north to shoot the suns out of the sky. 

Jungwoo whistles lowly, “North,” he says. “You said you’re heading east.” 

Again, Ten avoids Sicheng’s eye contact. “The person who can get me into the north is in the east.” 

Jungwoo nods, his eyes darting between Ten and Sicheng, nodding as he’s trying to work something out in his brain. 

Yukhei abruptly rises and stretches out his arms above his head, making his back pop. He’s avoiding eye contact with everyone, his words shake slightly. "I'm turning in for the night if you guys don't mind. Have to keep some sense of rhythm."

"I'm coming with. Didn't lay out those bedrolls for nothing," Sicheng says, making a move to follow Yukhei back to the tent. He turns around to Ten, waiting. 

Ten glances at Jungwoo. "We're coming in a bit." 

Sicheng shrugs. "Suit yourself." He falls into step next to Yukhei, having him laughing through his sniffles when Sicheng says something Ten can't make out clearly. 

"Your dynamic is interesting," Jungwoo points out as they watch the two retreat. "I believe there’s some truth to what you just said, but I don't believe a word of the little story you made up earlier on the spot though." 

Ten shakes his head. "You wouldn't believe the truth even if I told you." 

"Try me," Jungwoo says, a challenging glint in his eye. "I can assure you I've probably heard stranger things."

Ten wants to, he really wants to. But he can't because, "I promised him I wouldn't tell the truth."

"A man is all but his effort at keeping his promises."

"He was very persistent about it too."

Jungwoo waves it away. "Nevermind then, I won't push you. Just know if you need someone to talk, I'm here. Even after you ride off you can still write."

"Thank you," Ten says, touched at the sincerity of Jungwoo words. He lets his eyes drift towards the left side of Jungwoo's face. "I do actually have a question."

Jungwoo urges him to ask with a flick of his hand, like he had been waiting for it.

"Just stop me if I cross any lines but, your marks," Ten starts, "I couldn't help but notice they look a lot like the ones some of the sailors bear in the east."

"Did you ask them what they stand for?"

Ten is reminded of him pleading for an answer from Kun. One of his questions had been about Taeil's tattoos. They just didn't have enough time for any answers.

Ten shakes his head no. "I didn't have time."

Jungwoo shifts forward into his seat, leans in a little, turns his face so Ten can look closer at the marks adorning his face. "They don't so much as correlate with the ebb and flow of the water as that they stand for good fortune. Like a good luck charm while you're out at sea." 

Ten can't pull his eyes away from the glint of the lines. "Are they only used as a charm?"

"Not just necessarily as a charm. You can compare it to the tattoos the Barbarian tribes carry for certain gods."

"Like an offering," Ten asks carefully.

"Yeah," Jungwoo agrees, "like an offering."

Ten already knows the answer before he has even asked the question, but does so anyway. "Which god do you offer to?"

Jungwoo looks up, to a place beyond the suns. "The moon."

Ten pushes away thoughts of long blond hair, of a pearly white smile, of Taeil calling him _son._ "How come you're here and not close to open water?"

Jungwoo catches his gaze and holds it. "We all have our secrets don't we Tennie," he says, eyes sharp, but not unkind.

"Have the charms ever worked?" Ten asks instead.

Jungwoo laughs softly at that question. "Sometimes. Forgive me for saying it but the gods can be very irregular with their kindness. If they don't favor you, you just have to hope to catch them on a good day." 

* * *

In all their kindness, Yukhei and Jungwoo don’t just stock them up on food and weapons—handing Sicheng a knife and weapon oil because Kun hadn’t been lying when he said monsters had awoken with the suns—they also lend them an extra horse. With it, they leave in silence before the rest of the tribe can wake. When on a normal day the sun would be fully rosen, they stop to let the horses drink their fill at the Hanshui river. 

They’re following the course Yukhei and Ten had set out the night before, bent over a map and tracing routes in the comforts of the too hot tent. 

The route to Lai Yi when drawn on the map had been almost a straight diagonal line, hitting only the tip of Miao territory before moving in between Gaoyang and Fuxi to the east. Together, Ten and Yukhei had made some slight alteration to the route to make it doable. The biggest of them being a very much needed stop in Fuxi. 

They left in the trail through the Miao lands, they’ll cross through it while above the Hanshui river, it’s not even a real risk. 

While the horses drink Ten can’t help but to lose himself in his thoughts. He and Sicheng have been riding in silence yet again, only it's different than in the desert now. It doesn’t feel forced or like a drag. The downside of it is that the prolonged silence has sent Ten’s mind into overdrive. 

He can’t help but replay his conversation with Kun. Trying to remember the slope of his nose, his quiet movements, his bright smile. _Father,_ Ten wanted to call him at one point. The word leaves a bad taste in his mouth, so he keeps thinking of Kun as just that: Kun. Ten tries to remember the tones of Kun’s voice, the way he pronounced syllables so naturally in the northern tongue. 

His voice hadn’t been in Ten’s dream last night. Tern’s shrill voice had, like always, but not Kun’s. 

Sicheng is eyeing him curiously as he cards his own hand through the water, letting it slip freely between his fingers. The river is noticeably emptier, to the point it would start to alarm even if the cause had not been so obvious. The trees around them are faltering in the heat too, trying to stand tall and not wither but failing day by day. 

“Do you ever stop thinking?” 

Ten’s head shoots up and out of his thoughts. “Huh?” 

“Your brain,” Sicheng says, pointing to the side of his own head, “does it ever take a break.” 

“What did you mean when you said the northern tongue is not from the gods?” 

“Alright I got it, no need to answer, I can already see the answer is no.” 

“Did they get it from the giants, is that why it’s a sensitive topic.” 

“No.” Sicheng does not look overly eager to explain. Or enthusiastic, in any regard, at all. He drags his hand through the water again, eyes lost in what Ten is sure is not just the suns’ reflection.

Ten splashes water over his own face. “It’s fine, you don’t have to answer.” He won’t push if Sicheng doesn’t want to, not even if he’s dying to know. He has better manners than that. 

Minki lets her nose be pet and leans into his touches as his fingers run through her mane, trying to entangle some of the knots the wind has already blown into it. Ten longs for the brush he got in Gaoyang but it’s probably somewhere in the desert, buried under the sand. 

“They learned it from us,” Sicheng says. Ten almost doesn’t catch it. When he turns around he can see Sicheng still staring at the water, looking at something beyond. It reminds Ten of when he had asked why Taeyong picked Lai Yi as a place to settle. The look in his eyes he had, like he was seeing something no one else could. 

Ten comes closer, letting himself drop onto his hunches besides Sicheng. He doesn’t draw away from Ten. Together they look at Sicheng’s hand going underwater and resurfacing. When Sicheng pushes it under for the third time he speaks again. 

“My family generations back taught it to the gods and the trolls to be able to communicate. Both were eager to learn.” Ten doesn’t miss the sad smile that overtakes Sicheng’s features. “Little did we know we had given them the only power they needed to make us submit.”

Sicheng falls quiet again. His face is schooled back into neutrality. He didn’t move towards Doyoung to protect like Minki had to me, Ten is reminded. And he thinks that maybe, for the first time, Sicheng doesn’t hate this exchange as much as he pretended to at first. 

“I’m guessing your family didn’t choose to carry the suns across the sky.” 

“We didn’t mind at first, happy to help humanity move forward. As the suns grew though, with them did a rebellion.” Sicheng shakes the water off his hand before holding it back against the surface. “The giants had grown and they weren’t as eager to share as the trolls. They said if the gods had power of the sky and what lies below, they should hold the power of the earth that lies in between. This was back when they weren’t confined to the north, back when they roamed the land freely. They’re elemental based for a reason you know.” 

_Jotun,_ Taeyong had said, Dejun joining in too, _we say Ettin._

He can feel Sicheng steal a glance at him. “Naturally, it meant war,” he says it like it’s the most obvious solution, and maybe back then it was. 

Ten feels like a fool for thinking the little war between Hendery’s father and the previous emperor was the first official war. The concept had been around much longer, since the very beginning. 

“You didn’t pick the side of the gods,” Ten guesses. 

Sicheng’s eyes turn sharp, like he’s trying to figure out what Ten thinks of that. “We did not,” he confirms. “The giants had always been friendlier to us, not just using us for favors or power, instead letting us roam closer to the land and sleep in their caves. They weren’t scared of our dragon forms. Our relationship with them might have been shorter than with the gods who were there from the beginning, but in the heat of the moment it was an easy choice to make.” 

A smile draws over Sicheng’s face. “It’s nice to see that some giant’s blood has survived past the north. I like your friend Yukhei, he’s nice, a good example of his ancestors.” 

“Everyone always assumes he’s joking when he mentions having a giant for a mother. They think he’s just exaggerating.” 

Sicheng let’s out a chuckle and stands. Wiping his hand dry on his new pants that are definitely Jungwoo’s. “Let’s go, we can talk more while we ride.” 

Ten arches his brow. “You’ll actually hold a conversation with me while we travel this time.” 

“Don’t push it.” 

“I wouldn’t dare.” 

Sicheng is an easy conversation partner when he actually takes the liberty to talk. And Ten is happy to see that with each mile they leave in the dust, he does take that liberty more and more. 

He doesn’t shy away anymore from more sensitive topics, doesn’t tense up when Ten asks about the rest of the dragons (extinct), his relationship with Doyoung (strained), and his favorite food (meat, particularly mutton). 

Sicheng is as easy in his anecdotes as Ten. Sharing how his aunt was in fact a money hungry whore (his mother’s words) and probably the coiner of the stereotypical dragon. He isn’t afraid to drape himself over his horse and sulk when he admits he would’ve loved to be born a water dragon, because quite frankly wings can get really itchy really fast. He at first tries to hide when Ten tells him he thinks his wings are beautiful, but ends up blushing openly when he says he likes Ten’s eyes. 

He listens attentively while Ten stutters his way through explanations of landscapes and forests, falling over his words because he finds he is overexcited in his want to share. 

_And the people,_ Sicheng will ask once Ten’s ramble has come to an end, _how did they change from the next town over._

“In a different life you would’ve been a painter,” Sicheng says at one point, interrupting Ten’s explanation of the riverbank he once bathed in only to be attacked by a watersnake. 

Ten looks at him curiously, waiting for him to elaborate. 

“Your mind is that of an artist,” Sicheng says, hurrying with the rest of his words when he sees Ten’s mouth open to counter. “Don’t even try to convince me otherwise. You see the world and instead of shying away from the ugliness in it, you embrace it wholeheartedly and sketch it out in words so you can share your findings with others. It’s beautiful, truly.” Sicheng doesn’t hide his grin when he can see Ten’s face heat up. “I’m glad even if they gave you a bow instead of a brush you’re still able to express what’s inside of that mind of yours.” 

“Maybe my mind never standing still is the burden that comes with that.” 

“Then I’m happy you’ve chosen to bear it in return for this,” Sicheng says, and gives a nod in Ten’s general direction. Ten looks away when he can’t hide his own glee at the blunt statement. 

They switch between dragon and human tongue as they ride, Ten starting to use the dragon tongue just as much as the human one as the days pass. 

Sicheng is gentle in his corrections. _Don’t place too much emphasis on the end of that syllable or you’ll say something else entirely._ And patient when it takes a minute for Ten to search for a certain word. 

Ten in return talks Sicheng through the evolved human customs, laughing loudly when Sicheng is absolutely appalled by modern day agriculture. 

“You work with a _schedule?_ ” he bemoans to himself. “What about feeling, _intuition,_ where did the intuition go, Ten, please tell me.” 

Sicheng’s genuine interest makes Ten want to talk until he is breathless, and he does, his voice hoarse from overuse when they finally reach Fuxi. 

They book a room and Ten pays for two drinks when they settle at the bar. 

“Have you actually ever drunk ale?” Ten questions. 

Sicheng crosses his legs and looks around like he doesn’t know what to do with himself. “Ofcourse.” 

The barkeeper comes back with two half full glasses. The new policy, as she explains it, full price for half a glass because we’re in dire times.

Sicheng takes a sip and Ten can’t hold in the laughter that escapes him at the face Sicheng makes. 

“You drink this shit for pleasure?” 

“Is it not up to your taste darling?” the woman asks. 

Sicheng’s eyes grow wide, the question not having been meant for her. “No, it’s delicious,” Sicheng says and throws the entire thing back in one go. Ten snorts so hard when Sicheng starts coughing that his own ale almost comes back out of his nose. 

He laughs even harder when after slapping Sicheng on the back a couple of times to make sure he can breathe again, the woman starts flirting with him. Offering another drink on the house after his surely almost fatal near death experience. Sicheng just sits and stares which is taken as agreement. 

He slides Ten the drink when the woman moves away to serve another customer. 

“Drink if you want to live through the night,” Sicheng whispers to him. “Please.” 

Ten chugs. 

Sicheng actually falls asleep first out of the two of them.

Ten lets his eyes follow the steady up and down movement of his chest, accompanied by a few quiet snores every once in a while. Sicheng is splayed out on his bed, almost in starfish formation. The blinds are closed to still give them a sense of night, even if behind the curtains the suns shine on. 

Ten can’t help but notice how unguarded Sicheng has left himself. This isn’t just a case of him deeming Ten not harmful, this is him trusting Ten. 

Ten turns around on his own bed and bares his back to Sicheng easily, trusting him all the same.

* * *

The easy comradery they have built takes a hit once they come across their first monster. 

It comes roaring at them out of nowhere, thirsty for blood and hungry for flesh. The space in which Ten has to maneuver is tight, too tight. They had been riding through on a narrow trail, having to give up riding alongside one another halfway through because the canopy wouldn’t allow it. 

Ten hears the footsteps before he hears the growl. He tries to turn Minki around but quickly realizes it isn’t going to work. He urges her to an instant stop though, and turns around in his saddle, arrow drawn and ready to be fired. The boar is huge and running at them with the speed of a tiger. Ten shoots one arrow into it’s shoulder, trying to slow down it’s movements, it doesn’t work. It seems like the boar can’t feel the pain, adrenaline and hunger pushing it forward. It’s eyes are frantic and wild and pointing straight at Ten. 

Ten strings another arrow on his bow and aims for a headshot. He lets the arrow fire but changes its course at the last moment, having it hit a tree instead of what is in front of him.

Sicheng has positioned himself between Ten and the boar, who has seemingly become paralized at the mere sight of Sicheng. Ten takes the opportunity to swing himself off Minki so he can aim around Sicheng. The arrow goes through the boars’ eye, another one through it’s throat. Even adrenaline won’t let it live through that. 

Ten tracks Sicheng with his eyes as he moves to pull the arrows out of the boar, Sicheng bringing him the one that landed in the tree. 

“You shouldn’t have done that,” Ten says, still trying to search for what the boar saw. 

“It worked, didn't it. And we’ll have a good meal tonight.” He holds out the arrow for Ten to take but draws it back at the last moment. Ten thinks Sicheng is just fooling around but then he sees Sicheng’s eyes widen as they inspect the material of the arrow. 

He drops the arrow to the ground with a snarl. His fists clench on the empty air, Sicheng bares his teeth. “How dare you,” he spits in dragon tongue. “You play nice with me, tell me about your life and your little group of friends, let me relearn you **my** language and all the while you sharpen my bones into weapons. How fucking dare you.” 

Even if Sicheng throws the first punch, it’s over before it begins. It’s obvious Sicheng isn’t used to fighting in a human body and even if Ten’s forte isn’t brute strength, he has Sicheng pinned under him in under a minute. It spurs Sicheng’s anger on even more. 

Ten watches the veins in Sicheng’s neck throb. He wants to hide. Not because he had been found out, it was never a secret, but he can’t help but feel shame run down his neck. Still, he stands his ground, tries to form a point as Sicheng thrashes under him, throwing curse after curse at him, some too elaborate for Ten to understand. 

“What’s the difference between my bow being made out of tiger bones, Sicheng.” 

“Don’t say my name you son of a wh–” 

“What’s the difference between you about to skin that boar? What’s dead is dead, Sicheng.” 

Sicheng has stopped yelling but is still looking at him like he wants to tear his head off and roast it along with the boar. 

“I’ve had them since before I knew you. We were recommended dragon tendons by a friend, said it would pierce through anything but they’d put a ban on it so he had to get it through illegal channels,” Ten says, exasperated. “I’m sorry. I should have said something sooner.” 

“It _can_ pierce through anything.” Sicheng doesn’t look away from him as he says, “Even the flesh of a god, that’s why it was banned.” 

Ten relaxes his grip in understanding. So he had been right when he had pointed his bow at Doyoung in the desert. Sicheng pushes him off and Ten lets himself roll sideways. 

“I can throw them out right now,” he says, already unstrapping the quiver from his back. 

Sicheng’s response makes him halt though. “Don’t be a fool. It would be a waste, and besides you need them to pierce through the suns, you won’t be able to take them down with copper or iron.” 

“I’ll ask Hendery to make ones from different materials when all of this is over.” 

Sicheng has drawn his arms around his legs, resting his head on his knees as he calms his still ragged breathing down. “May I suggest something,” he asks. 

“Of course.” 

“Maybe try human bone.” 

Ten’s laugh is shaky, but he can’t help the sigh of relief. “I’ll tell Hendery to consider it. But I’m afraid you’ll have to provide the supplies.” 

Sicheng lets his tongue glide over his teeth. “That won’t be a problem.” 

He stands back up and holds a hand out for Ten. “You’re skinning the boar,” Sicheng says as Ten scramble back to his feet. 

Ten accepts the offer of peace for what it is and motions for Sicheng to give him a knife. 

Instead of Sicheng withdrawing from him, he draws closer. 

Ten isn’t blind, he has seen the way Sicheng’s eyes linger on his body when he bends to wash his face or scrape Minki’s hoofs. He knows Sicheng’s eyesight is also perfectly fine so the guy must’ve long ago picked up on Ten’s own wandering gaze, one time even being bold enough to call him out for it with a grin. Although the tension is there, they do not act on it. 

Sicheng let’s his hands linger when he hands Ten his water canteen, but he never leans in further. Ten teaches him how to properly hold a hoof scraper and keeps his hand on Sicheng’s back in encouragement, but he doesn’t let it wander. 

It stays like that as they ride into territory that Ten slowly starts to recognize. It’s hard with most of the grass not looking as green anymore as when he rode through these plains for the first time, but the feeling is still the same. 

“Your descriptions came very close,” Sicheng admits. “I’d like to say they didn’t do it proper justice but the heat has made an impact. And with that I don’t mean for the better.” 

“I’m not taking you to the flower fields with this weather. You should come back once they have properly regrown.” Ten knows Sicheng’s first impression would be wasted if they went now. And isn’t life all about first impressions. 

Sicheng tilts his chin up. “I thought you said they were beautiful no matter the forecast. And besides, you’ll be off to who knows where once all this has settled. Who’ll be my guide then?” 

“I think you’re overlooking the fact you also have a position to return to.” 

“You underestimate me, Ten, I have no intention of being locked away there again.” Sicheng speaks the words loud and clear, like he has long ago made up his mind about the fact. Maybe even before Ten came around. 

“Well, I can be very patient when I want to be. I’ll wait for your lazy ass to turn back up.” Ten surprises himself with how earnest his words sound. 

“Is that a promise?” Sicheng challenges, eyebrow raised. 

This time, Ten does not hesitate to say, “It is.”

“Then I promise I’ll find my way back.” 

His left pocket is full, but the bottle of tree sap that Yangyang gave him was lost somewhere in his scramble in the desert. So in the newly vacated space of his right pocket, Ten puts the promise, careful not to lose this one. 


	6. Emergent Brightness

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Emergent Brightness — when the sun ascends from the Fusang Tree and commences its journey

Lai Yi is exactly as Ten had left it. The stones are slippery and wet because apparently even during a national crisis the rain will still keep pouring. 

The only difference is Johnny’s tavern. Whereas before it had been crowded, it is now exploding with people. Some are even waiting under the newly put up shelters outside. 

It’s a pain to maneuver the horses through the masses, but when Aisha spots Ten she quickly comes to help, the people parting for her instantly. 

She has grown since Ten last saw her, her black hair now almost reaches her waist and when she pushes a piece of it behind her ear Ten can see the gleam of a piercing. He wonders how Taeyong got Johnny to agree. 

Aisha guides them around the tavern to the back and urges Ten and Sicheng to go in. 

“Go help Johnny,” she orders. “It’s ten times busier than it gets on a national holiday.” 

“But,” Sicheng starts. “The horses.” 

“I’ll take care of it,” she says, grabbing the reins from them. “Go inside, greet dad and put on an apron. We need all the help we can get.” 

Ten pushes the door to the back storage room open, letting Sicheng enter before him. Before he can go in as well, Aisha calls out to him. 

“Ten,” she says, that same big smile she and her sister share overtaking her face. “I’m glad you came back.” 

“Me too,” Ten says and finds himself meaning it. Before he can linger longer, he follows Sicheng inside. 

It’s not as disorganized as Ten had expected it to be. In fact, it’s more organized than Ten has ever seen the tavern be in the weeks he worked in it. People stand in neat lines that meander through the entire lower floor, all waiting for their turn to be handed water. 

Before he can step forward to find Johnny, he’s being pulled aside. An apron is thrust into his hands by an exhausted looking Yangyang. 

“Right in time for the afternoon surge,” he says. “Take your boy and set up a station outside, we don’t have any more room in here.” 

Yangyang keeps his hand wrapped around his arm as he pulls Ten along, Sicheng following behind them trying to tie on his own apron. 

“Stay in the shade, we’re already short, we can’t lose even more.” 

Ten nods. Motioning for Sicheng to turn around when he sees Sicheng has given up on tying and just settled on having the strings lose. 

“Jae will come with the next cart in a bit. For now just try to gather the people in a line around the tavern,” Yangyang orders, pointing out the direction in which the people should stand to not be exposed to the sunlight. “A gallon each. Should be more, especially with this heat, but again–”

“You’re already short,” Ten supplies.

Yangyang nods. “Right.” 

It’s grueling, even in the shade. Harder than riding through woods where the leaves still offer some kind of cover and the breeze is kind enough to sweep over your face every once in a while. 

The teamwork though, is fascinating, working like a well oiled machine. When he gets stolen away by Johnny to help carry the jerry cans of water into the tavern, Ten learns the government isn’t sending any help to the east so most of the towns are doing what they’re doing here. Creating a safety base for water storage from which they can provide the masses. The water well in the middle of the village has dried up, water to houses has been cut off and just the rain alone—although it is a blessing—is long not enough to sustain the people. 

From morning till somewhere around 5 they serve water and water only, working with a stamp card for each person to get their day’s fill. In the evenings Dejun takes the reins, handing out the food he has spent the entire day preparing. 

It’s a system with flaws and faults but it’s working, and that’s what matters. When the government didn’t supply them with anything they had to take matters into their own hands, making sure the families who can’t live off of catching fish anymore are still getting at least one hot meal a day. 

The seas have only gotten worse, Yangyang tells Ten when they have finally closed up for the night. All of them falling into chairs with exhaustion. Yiren falls asleep against Taeyong’s side in three seconds flat. 

“There is a water serpent now if you can believe it,” Yangyang says with disbelief. “A fucking serpent preventing us from sailing north.” 

“Language, Yang,” Johnny murmurs. 

“So… the sap,” Ten says, eyeing the people around the table, in the end deciding that all of them probably already know. “You haven’t gone north yet for the shipment.” 

Johnny shakes his head. “It’s too dangerous. Yang wants to sail regardless, if only to repay their kindness but–” 

“Kindness?” Ten asks. 

“The giants we supply to have been trying to send their normal food supplies they would get from some of the northern villages during these months to us, out of thanks,” Taeyong says. “I’m gonna put her to bed,” he tells Johnny, sweeping up Yiren into his arms. She doesn’t wake. “Aisha, you coming?” 

Aisha nods, also eager to get an early night’s sleep. “Your horses are safe in the stable next to the florist,” she tells Ten, cracking the widest yawn when she finishes speaking. 

“Hand!” Johnny says. 

“Sorry dad,” she says sheepishly, before following Taeyong upstairs. 

Ten eyes Sicheng for help on how to go about this. Along their trek he had explained Yangyang’s contact with the giants, how they would sail north with him to enter into the region. And maybe, if they were lucky enough, to be guided to where they needed to go. It had been extremely wishful thinking, but it had been the best plan Ten could come up with, Sicheng agreeing that if Ten didn’t want to enter with force this might be the only way. 

Sicheng shrugs, “My offer to just ride into the north still stands. Or walk, I don’t really care.” 

Johnny’s mouth drops open. “You’re planning to do _what?_ When you say north I swear to the gods you best not be talking about the true north. _”_

“Well,” Ten begins, relying on their cover story they had sharpened along the miles. “The emperor kind of asked me to head true north.” 

“For what?” Johnny exclaims. “To say hello?” 

“A letter will do just fine for that,” Dejun says, walking out of the kitchen into the front room. He stops in his tracks when he sees Ten. For a couple long seconds, both of them are silent. Dejun breaks it. “I thought that was your voice.” 

The grin that splits out over Dejun’s face is so wide, it almost engulfs him whole. “You son of a bitch.” 

Behind him Ten can hear Sicheng snort but he can’t turn around and call him out on it because Dejun is already running, almost squashing him as he engulfs Ten in a hug. 

“Dejun I can’t breathe,” Ten tries to wheeze out. 

Dejun just ignores him. “You stupid fucking fool,” he says when he finally lets Ten go. “Taeyong was worried sick.” 

It makes Ten laugh. “Is this your way of saying you were also worried.” 

Dejun scoffs. “I never worry about you, that’s Hendery’s job.” 

Ten arches his eyebrow. “Hendery huh, no Guanheng?” 

“We had to beat it out of him,” Taeyong says as he comes back into the room, walking to Ten at once. “I’m still trying to get him to just call him Hen but he won’t have it.” 

“He’s a very stubborn motherfucker,” Ten says solemnly as he let’s Taeyong wrap him up into a hug as Dejun exclaims, _he’s right here!_

“I missed you,” Taeyong says, “sorry I couldn’t welcome you back earlier.” 

“That’s okay Yong, I missed you too,” Ten says. He tilts his face away from Taeyong’s shoulder and throws his head back. “All of you.” 

“I’m not hugging you,” Yangyang states immediately. Taeyong and Ten separate with a laugh. 

As Ten lets himself fall back into his seat next to Sicheng he notices he’s looking at them with _something._ Ten at first thinks it might be really well hidden disgust, or jealousy, maybe. But as Sicheng’s eyes travel over all the people gathered, watching how Taeyong settles in next to Johnny like it’s second nature, how Dejun barks at Ten to move his own ass, Ten realizes it’s neither of the two. It’s longing. Longing for something from the past. 

Sicheng shakes himself out of it when Johnny tells Ten not to think his attention has been diverted. But before he can start grilling Ten exactly about the how’s and the what’s and the why’s, Taeyong cuts in, looking at Ten like he isn’t quite sure he’s really sitting in front of him. 

“We got another letter after you had left, weeks later,” Taeyong smiles, “it said Yukhei had woken up. And that Jungwoo said he would forever be in your debt, and not to argue that, he’d heard from Yukhei over the years how much you argued about things like that. Said to not even think about acting like it was nothing. Your supplier, too, would be treated like a guest of honor if they were ever to cross paths.” 

“I was quite flattered,” Yangyang admits. 

Taeyong sucks in a breath, he keeps his voice neatly even when he says, “It didn’t mention Hendery.” 

“It said you yourself would probably know more about that,” Dejun says, “seeing as this letter would probably not even find you as you were—per Yukhei’s calculations—already halfway across the country.” 

Ten shrugs. “What can I say, Yukhei knows me well.” He knows he’s delaying the inevitable, that he should just get on with the story he and Sicheng thought up. Sicheng tried to convince him to not mention Doyoung at all, but Ten had countered Taeyong would know he was leaving things out. And besides, he couldn’t let them think Hendery was dead, or just tell them he was alive without an explanation. So Ten finds himself relaying the same story he told Jungwoo and Yukhei. 

Hendery was taken by a god, he explains, the same god who fathered the suns and now wants me to shoot them down. 

They listen, nod, like it doesn’t surprise them anymore at this point. Not even Dejun—who questions everyone and everything he comes across—looks sceptical. They believe each and every word that travels past his lips and it makes him feel terrible for not being able to share the rest with them. For not being able to share his other worries besides how he can get to the top of that hill. 

_Even though he might still live,_ Ten wants to say, _I’m afraid of still not getting him back, even if I succeed._ He wants to tell them about Jungwoo saying you should just get lucky and catch a god on a good day, wants to tell them it’s very much looking like Doyoung hasn’t had a good day in decades. 

He tells them about meeting Sicheng in the tavern where he actually met Taeil, bonding over their complaints over the bad stew. Taking him along with him because after being alone out _there_ he didn’t want to make the rest of the journey having only himself as company. 

Taeyong clutches his hand then, and says his own words back to him, “You did well, Ten.” 

“I was exhausted. I fell and didn’t think I’d wake again,” Ten admits, looking at Taeyong. He takes a shaky breath and pours everything he had felt while walking through the sands into his statement. The unending wasteland, the doubt, the fear, both for what he would find and for finding nothing at all. “I was scared.” 

Taeyong adds his other hand, holding one of Ten’s in both his own. “It’s okay to be scared, Tennie, you’re allowed to feel fear.” 

“Yeah?” Ten breathes out. 

Taeyong nods, once, stark, and full of conviction. “Yes, Ten, you are.” 

Ten can feel a hand settle onto his leg, warming it even more under the touch. Even when Dejun notices, pretending very hard not to see, Sicheng doesn’t withdraw. He just keeps his hand settled on Ten’s leg, not like a claim, but as a pillar. 

The heat of Sicheng’s hand stays while Johnny ravages through the cupboards to produce something that is not water. It stays throughout the evening while they try to explore every angle and in the end always draw back to the same conclusion. It doesn’t move when it is in the end Yangyang that ends the discussion by saying that he _will_ sail.

In the desert, while riding on Minki’s back to civilization, Ten had asked Sicheng if he was going to run. This is Sicheng saying no. 

* * *

Yangyang hands over his apron to Sicheng and tells Ten to ditch his own, needing his help in getting the boat ready. Without question, the other sailors that still linger around the shores help them retie the sails and clear the top deck. It’s not the biggest boat in the harbor, most of the other boats beating it out in size, but it does well long distance, and it can hold its own at sea. 

The captain with the eyepatch takes one look at them and offers his ship for use. It’s a huge declaration of trust, especially when he adds that he and his crew will sail with them as well, but he understands when they decline. It’s too big, too overwhelming, too many people that would learn of Yangyang’s secret trading business. 

“Maybe another time then,” he says and adds a wink with his still visible eye. “We’ll pray for you regardless.” 

They go back with Jaehyun for the last water supply drop at the beginning of the evening and ride back with him at night. No jerry cans or food in the back of the wagon but crates with vials and vials of plum tree sap. 

It takes three days in total to get everything set up, another day while they rest and outfit themselves for war. On the fifth day the arguing starts back up. Both Dejun and Taeyong want to come, even Yiren volunteering and Aisha soon after. Johnny and Jaehyun can’t, they can’t be pulled away from their daily tasks, and actually neither can the rest. 

In the end, it’s Yangyang again that makes the decision. He states that three is enough, so that is how it will be. The rest will stay behind, even Minki, who looks at Ten with sad eyes for half an hour straight when he tells her she can’t come. She survived the desert, just barely, Ten is not expecting any godly intervention to keep them alive in the cold. 

Strangely, he does not feel nervous as he counts his arrows and polishes them while Sicheng watches him from his bed. 

“Shouldn’t you be doing the same with your knife?” 

Sicheng gives him a funny look. “I won’t be fighting with my knife when it comes down to it.” 

“Maybe use it as a toothpick then.” 

Sicheng throws his head back to laugh. “I’ll give it to Yangyang.” 

Ten does not feel nervous as he says his goodbyes to Yiren and Aisha, to Jaehyun and Dejun, to Johnny who pulls him close and tells him to look out for Yangyang, to Taeyong who pulls him closer and tells him to come back. Ten hugs him back just as tight but doesn’t speak a promise into existence he doesn’t know he can keep. 

He doesn’t feel nervous once they set sail, Yangyang at the front of the boat to steer instead of at the back to wave at Johnny until they vanish out of sight. 

Sicheng, though, is jumpy. He stays away from the edges of the boat and will hide below deck for hours on end. At first, Ten thinks it’s because Sicheng literally houses fire inside of him, and might just not be a fan of the water. But there is something about the way he avoids looking east, like there is something there he doesn’t want to see. Or rather someone. 

It gets to the point Yangyang starts asking him why the hell he even brought Sicheng in the first place if the guy feels so uncomfortable. They could’ve used a fighter, someone that knows how to hold a sword and wield it, both Taeyong and Dejun would’ve been better picks. Ten doesn’t engage, just tells Yangyang to trust him, to give Sicheng the benefit of the doubt. 

Sicheng proofs to pull his weight when the water starts getting restless. It has been two days, maybe three, of smooth sailing. Almost too smoothly. Ten knows Yangyang and Sicheng feel it too, that something has been following them for a while now. 

They’re in the middle of open water, Lai Yi miles and miles behind and the north still not in sight. Yangyang holds his hand on the knife Sicheng gave him as he steers, and Sicheng positions himself above deck. They have no choice but to play the waiting game. 

The boat might be able to take a hit, it’s big enough for that, but not much more. It has Ten feeling on edge and like Yangyang he wants to keep his bow in his hand at all times. Ten is used to hunting, stalking a prey and waiting for the right moment to strike. He is also used to being hunted, like when the wolves in the woods around their cabin would track him instead and he’d only find out when the trail ended that he was the prey all along. 

This isn’t any different. He is not the hunter but the hunted. It doesn’t bother him. What does bother him is that the serpent has a clear advantage. But Ten has fought against lesser odds. 

It finally strikes after following them for the entire day, at the time they would usually settle in for sleep. It makes Ten wonder if maybe it was following them unnoticeable for even longer. Maybe since they sailed out of the harbor. 

It begins with the water becoming more troubled than it already is, easily visible in the light. Which is the only advantage they have. Or at least that’s what Ten thinks. 

In hindsight, he should have seen it coming when the boar had stopped dead in its tracks as soon as it had set its sights on Sicheng. Or when Sicheng had laughed at his face when Ten asked if he wasn’t going to sharpen his knife. 

But then again, nothing could’ve ever prepared him for the display before him. 

The serpent rises out of the water faster than anticipated. Thousands of teeth stretched out in an ugly smile. Ten hears the clatter of a knife falling to the ground and moves himself between Yangyang and the monster on instinct, bow drawn, arrow strung, waiting for the moment to strike. 

When in doubt, he has always learned, go for the eyes. 

The serpent surges forward, slime sticking between its teeth as it opens its mouth fully. Ten doesn’t watch the purple tongue or the horns on top of its head. He just watches the eye draw closer and something in his mind tells him _now._ He lets the arrow fly. It lands. Piercing through the eye because Sicheng was right when he said dragon tendons could push through anything. 

The serpent pauses in its surge forward, but it's not because Ten has pierced its eye. In fact, Ten can see the other eye of the serpent isn’t looking at him at all. 

_Don’t take your eye off the prey,_ is a code Ten lives by. But behind him Yangyang is clutching his jacket and let’s out a breathless _oh._

Ten takes his eyes off the water serpent and looks to his right. 

_Beautiful,_ Ten had called them, and yet just that word alone doesn't do Sicheng’s wings justice. They’re larger than life, much like Sicheng himself. They fan out, on full display and Sicheng let’s himself come closer to the serpent who is still taking Sicheng in, almost like it’s paralyzed. 

A rumble comes out of the dragon’s throat in the form of a low shriek. Yangyang realizes it at the same time Ten does. 

“They’re communicating,” he whispers to Ten, keeping his voice low, scared to draw the attention back to them. Yangyang’s eyes widen when his mind catches up. “That’s, he just, he’s—” 

“He’s telling it to go,” Ten confirms. And together they watch how Sicheng urges the serpent in the northern tongue to leave, not having to ask twice. 

“Where the fuck did you find a dragon,” Yangyang hisses. 

Sicheng turns back to them when the serpent submerges itself into the water again, darting away to the east at lightning speed. His features get warped into one another again and again and again until his face flattens and becomes smaller, just like his body, returning to his human form. He’s smiling, his nose scrunching up as he tries to scratch at his shoulder blades.

“His wings get itchy really fast,” Ten blurts out. 

“The gods gifted you with one thing,” Yangyang says, “and it sure wasn’t being a fucking poet.” 

* * *

Naturally, Yangyang has questions. And to Ten’s surprise, Sicheng takes the reins in answering them, being honest with his answers too. 

He tells Yangyang how they really met, what exchange they made, how he made Ten keep his identity a secret. 

Ten takes advantage of Sicheng’s sudden openness when they find themselves alone to ask why he has been avoiding looking to the east. 

Sicheng’s response is easy. “Doyoung is waiting at the Fusang tree in the east. I didn’t want to draw his attention, hoping to slip by, but he must know by now that we are en route.” 

Ten wonders why that’s such a bad thing, and asks. “It’s not just because you don’t want to go back to him is it?” 

Sicheng looks at him in the darkness of the room they share below decks. Without the light his eyes look purely red, the brown gone and forgotten. He considers Ten, like on that first day Ten had pointed his bow at him. 

He doesn’t directly answer, instead asks a question back. “Why do natural disasters happen?” 

“Because of the gods,” Ten says. “But this is something entirely else, you yourself told me the suns have minds of their own.” 

“The water has a mind of its own too, Ten, that doesn’t mean it can’t be bent.” 

“But the gods are in just as much commotion as us.” 

Sicheng nods. “Doyoung spent days pleading for them to come down, I assume Kun did much the same.” 

Ten actually doesn’t know, but he can imagine that’s how it went. 

“Other gods too probably, when both of them didn’t succeed. I’m sure if you went to the emperor he would’ve told you even he called out to them.” 

“Then, if not the gods…” Ten’s mind lights up and it becomes clear as day. “You’re saying it was the giants.” 

“I’m not saying anything,” Sicheng states. “Why the giants? Talk me through that.” 

“Dissatisfaction, anger, countless reasons. They lost a war against the gods, got the short end of the stick. Banished to the north, probably lost half their kind in the battle.” 

“More than half,” Sicheng says, reminding Ten that he was there. He saw it happen. 

“If it were the giants,” Sicheng asks, “would you blame them?” 

Ten disregards the question. “Do you think they’re planning an uprising?” His mouth falls open. Kun had told him he had to hurry, because, “The trolls will awaken out of the ice caps. Fuck, how could I have been so stupid not to see.” Ten furrows his brows. “They want to open another war, and rule over what if they come out of it? Dried up land and humanity that will have been burnt to a crisp or died from dehydration?” 

“I don’t think the giants were planning an uprising before, but maybe now that the opportunity has arisen, who is to say?” 

“What do you mean before?” 

Sicheng takes a breath. “How would they have gained access to the suns?” He’s guiding Ten through this, step by step, letting Ten catch up to a point he already knows. 

“I don’t know. Walk up The Widow’s Trail and yell at them?” Ten tries to consider the options. “They could hardly just swim east to the Fusang tree because Doyoung is there most of the time. Bathing them and getting them ready to rise. And waiting for them in the west would also not be an option either because you said Doyoung sometimes waits there with you. And even if he wouldn’t that would still leave—” 

For the second time that day, Ten’s brain comes to a screeching halt, all the puzzle pieces rearranging themselves to show him the finished result. 

“The giants weren’t the only ones to go almost extinct because of the war,” Sicheng says. “This isn’t a competition of who had it worse, us or them, they suffered enough. But Ten, they still have the ones who lived.” 

Sicheng doesn’t need to say more. Ten knows. He remembers how Sicheng had looked at him and his friends back in Johnny’s tavern. How happy Sicheng had been to step into conversation with Yukhei and argue with Jungwoo. 

The red in Sicheng’s eyes seems to fade out as he sinks into himself bit by bit, that constant fire that he carries with him leaving his body. 

“I just needed a diversion, something, anything. But then Doyoung rushed west and stayed to wait until the suns came down. Not that they care, this is the most fun they’ve had in eons,” Sicheng laughs. “It didn’t take much convincing at all.” 

“And then I came along and wasn’t that just convenient.” Ten narrows his eyes. “But you didn’t run. Because you were scared Doyoung would come after you,” he guesses. 

“Sure, for the first few days. But you’ve seen that the snap was just a trick to convince you he has the power over me. I could’ve flown off while you were sleeping in Fuxi and he wouldn’t have caught me if I hid myself well enough.” 

“Sooner or later he would have noticed you went missing, surely. And proceeded to search the entire earth for you.” 

“I wouldn’t be stupid enough to hide on earth.” 

“So you weren’t scared, then why stay?” 

“Because for the first time since the war I felt like it was worth it to live, even if I had to spend my days stuck in human skin,” Sicheng says in one breath. 

Silence falls after that, thick with tension. Ten wants to be mad, he really does. It would be so much easier if he was. 

“Ten please say something.” 

“He will come for you, maybe not now but he will figure it out.” 

Sicheng’s mouth is drawn into a thin line. “Are you angry?” 

Ten stands, Sicheng makes a motion to follow but halts when Ten puts his hand up. 

“Are you still mad about my arrows?” Ten asks. 

“No.” 

“There you go then,” he says and opens the door. “I need air.” 

He finds Yangyang leaning over the railing of the boat, staring off into the distance the serpent disappeared in. Ten let’s himself slump down next to him. 

“Fight?” 

Ten turns his head and looks up suspiciously at Yangyang from under his lashes. “How much did you hear?” 

“Not much, just bits and pieces before I realized now was not the right time to satisfy my curiosity about more dragon anatomy facts.” 

“You’ve grown up,” Ten states. “It makes me feel old.” 

Yangyang chuckles. “You’re really becoming an old man.” 

“Don’t remind me,” Ten says with a groan. “I wake up some days and feel like I’ve lived for decades already.” 

“And have you?” Yangyang asks, eyebrow raised. 

Ten laughs disbelievingly. “I’m going to be honest with you, I don’t know.” 

“That’s okay, we all have a lapse in memory every once in a while.” Yangyang shrugs in good humor. “Or, you know, a little longer I guess.” 

“I take back what I said, you’re still the same brat who made me pay for free drinks.” 

“I’m going to make you pay from now on out too, until you steal my job again and are back to being a full time employee. Until then, we don’t do charity for the commoners, especially not the annoying ones.” 

Ten throws his head back and laughs, loud and clear. “What if I attain god status.” 

“Then I’d say you’re still annoying and congratulate Dejun on being right about your god complex.” 

“He looks weird without a beard. I had gotten so used to it it’s now weird to see him without.” 

“It’s for the food. He shaved it off a while ago, you were just too busy out there picking up dragon boys with a temper.” 

“When we first met I pointed an arrow at his head and made him walk in front of me like that for miles.” 

“And they say romance is dead,” Yangyang let’s out a fake longing sigh. “If my future partner doesn’t draw a weapon on me at first sight I’ll have to politely decline.” 

Ten buries his head in his arms and groans even louder. 

“Sorry, I didn’t catch that.” 

Ten accidentally raises his foot and lets it come down on Yangyang’s own. Hard. 

“Gods, alright, no need to get aggressive,” Yangyang says, raising his own foot, and missing Ten’s by just a hair.

Ten grins. “Predictable.” 

Now it’s Yangyang’s turn to groan. “Almost getting killed hasn’t made you any less annoying either.” 

“I’d say it’s one of my best charms.” 

The stare Yangyang gives him could kill on sight, but he let’s it go.

“Is it unforgivable?” Yangyang asks. 

“Hmm?” Ten questions. 

Yangyang nods to the ground. “What he did, is it unforgivable?” 

“Depends on who you ask.” 

Yangyang snorts. “Well, I think you should ask yourself.”

Ten stands up from his sulk. “I’m going back down.” 

“Predictable,” Yangyang says, and just laughs when Ten’s expression turns offended. “Dejun says you can get really scary when you’re angry, I’d say that’s not this.” 

Ten doesn’t respond, just calls out, “Go to bed sometime soon.” and heads back to below decks. 

When Sicheng sees him again he tries for a careful smile. 

It’s hotter than it has been in decades, so naturally Ten says, “I’m only here because it’s cold.” 

Sicheng holds the thin blanket open in invitation. Ten accepts it. 

When Sicheng reaches to wrap an arm around his middle, Ten doesn’t draw away. 

The next day the cold sets in. It creeps up on them slowly but surely. Settling over the entire boat and the people on it. 

They had prepared for this, had taken with them the thickest coats they could find in the back of Johnny’s closet. 

The closer they sail, the colder it gets, and yet Sicheng walks on the top deck with his coat open, almost entirely unaffected. 

When Sicheng ties his extra scarf around Ten, Ten takes the moment to ask him about it. Sicheng just shrugs, says that he much prefers the warmth of the desert during the day but there too, does it get freezing cold at night. He’s just lucky his blood keeps him warm. 

Ten spends most of his time at the head of the boat, looking out north to what’s waiting for them. And slowly, those nerves he was so good at keeping down crawl back up through his body. The questions start circulating through his head again. 

What if they don’t recognize Yangyang? What if the giants are really planning an uprising? What if the trolls have already broken out of the ice? 

He urges his mind to stop but it won’t, reaching instead for the black holes in his memories on its own, trying to figure out what belonged there before he started to forget. 

The weirdest thing of all is that Tern has been quiet. She doesn’t scream in his dreams, just sits and stares, smiling sometimes when she feels like it. It leaves Ten feeling off kilter and unbalanced and he finds himself longing for her screaming, if only for familiarity’s sake. 

Sicheng has seen him slowly deteriorate into his own brain, circling around himself again and again. He tries to pull Ten out of it at night, when it’s the worst. He places his hand on Ten’s stomach and whispers about the old days. He tells tales his own parents told him, ones of a dry and barren earth, slowly blooming into the one the humans now know. He speaks of his family and their weird dynamic, of all of them being invited into the caves of the trolls, and later the ones of the giants. He talks about the other dragon breeds, together fantasizing about the color of Ten’s scales if he were a dragon too. And when Ten is on the edges of sleep, Sicheng speaks of nothing at all, just whispers nothings into his ear, dragging out the vowels of the northern syllables. 

It starts to feel familiar, hearing Sicheng’s voice at night and again as soon as he wakes up, sleepily telling Ten to move because he might look cute while he sleeps but now that he is awake can he _please_ move off of his arm. 

Ten knows that he is crossing the line into stupidity, but he finds he doesn’t care. He craves for it and won’t deny himself. So on the night before they’re supposed to dock, Ten turns around and pushes himself on top of Sicheng so he is straddling his thighs. He kisses him unprompted, instantly addicted to the way Sicheng cups his face and kisses him back slowly, like he wants to take all the time in the world to learn how Ten likes to be kissed. He drags his hand down and let’s it settle on Ten’s thigh, leaning back to look at him with appreciation. 

Ten searches for Sicheng’s other hand to intertwine their fingers, he doesn’t let go, just leans back in to recapture Sicheng’s lips, only pulling away to ask if Sicheng kept the weapon oil Jungwoo gave him.

* * *

They dock a couple miles to the east of the city Shanrong. No one comes here, Yangyang explains, too far away from other civilizations. Shanrong is one of the cities that trades with the giants in exchange for living ground. Maybe some of the food Lai Yi has been sent has even come from there. 

Ten thinks Yangyang is going to trudge right ahead but he jumps out after the boat has docked, stretches his arms and legs, and drops back down onto the ground. 

Ten kicks his leg. “And now, captain?” 

“We wait.” 

Sicheng is looking ahead at the mountains in the distance. “Do you want me to scout?” 

“They’ll come soon enough,” Yangyang says. He laughs, “Don’t worry, they’re pretty hard to miss.” 

“How are you so sure?” Ten asks. 

“They always do.”

And sure enough, after approximately half an hour, figures appear on the horizon. Three of them. One of them has a long white beard, stretching almost to his waist, the mustache just as long but braided at the bottom. Taeyong would probably start drooling at the gems woven into it. 

Another one has long black hair, pinned back by metal bands and falling in waves around her face. But the one that really draws Ten attention is the third one, the tallest of the three. He wears a helmet on his head from which antler like horns spring, decked out in the middle with the same gems that adorn the beard of the other male giant. The helm makes him look even taller. Although his red hair that ends around his neck is another reason that makes him stick out, it’s not the reason why Ten’s attention gets drawn to him. It’s because the giant is looking right back at Ten. 

Sicheng is antsy beside him, moving just slightly to position himself in front of Ten. Yangyang moves himself to stand, smiling as he waits for them to come closer. It doesn’t take many paces. 

He hears Yangyang call out to them, greeting them one by one, the giants bending down so they can listen to him introduce his friends. Normally, if someone was watching him with this much attention, Ten would reach for his bow. But this time, there is no need. 

When Yangyang says his name, _Ten,_ the eyes of the giant with the helm grow ever wider. And Ten knows it's both of them that feel it, that somewhere, sometime, they have met before. In the back of his mind, another door opens and he doesn’t have to wait for Yangyang to say his name because Ten already knows. Just like he had known with Kun. 

“Yuta,” he says, and watches as the giant breaks out in the brightest smile Ten has ever seen, brighter even than the sun itself. 

There are no horses here, not this far north. So after having loaded out all the tree sap from the boat they walk. The giants carry the crates like it’s nothing while the three of them struggle to keep up. 

It makes Ten long for Minki, and he automatically reaches for his left pocket, taking the item out just to see the orange. When the snow hits, though, he is glad Minki is not here. They can’t have made her wear the snow boots they are currently using to make their way through. 

The giants soon bend down again, and let them climb onto their shoulders, Yangyang going without hesitation. Sicheng and Ten look at each other for a second, considering, before both of them turn back to climb on as well. It makes travelling a thousand times easier, and it also gives Ten the time to look around and admire the landscape. 

They cut a steady path through the snow and veer to the left to walk into the mountain range. It turns into a slow climb, ever the more going uphill. The giants don’t seem to be struggling, Yuta assuring Ten that, really, this is nothing. 

The ground around them is clad in white, the suns long not strong enough to melt everything away at once. And just before they turn right, Ten can see the peak of a mountain appear on the horizon, higher than all the ones around it. 

They walk down a steep slope and into what seems to be a tunnel. Once they emerge again at the end of it and into the light, Ten doesn’t find himself in a cave or open land, but the insides of a castle. 

The giants let them down carefully and urge them to follow them further in. They walk through hallway after halfway until they arrive upon a great hall from which a chandelier swings. Without having to be told, Ten knows it’s made out of salt, the female giant confirming it to him when he asks. 

Yuta gives the couple of crates he was carrying to the other two who walk off, promising to come share a drink with the humans later if they decide to stick around. The three of them are taken to another room and as Ten’s feet trail after Yuta’s bigger ones, he recognizes this exact image. Him trying to keep up with the giant while walking through these halls. If he were asked to find the kitchen, Ten thinks his feet might just lead him there. 

Yuta takes them to a rather large sitting room where he tells them to find some chairs while he gets a fire started. Once the fire is fully lit Ten and Yangyang instantly abandon their seats and rush over to it, taking off their gloves and letting the heat lick at their fingertips. Sicheng and Yuta stay a few paces away, looking at them with amusement. 

“You’re not cold?” Yuta asks Sicheng. 

Sicheng jumps into action, having forgotten that normal humans can’t just warm themselves. “Yes, I am, I can just endure it longer,” he says, pushing his way in between Ten and Yangyang. 

Yuta leaves the room and reappears a few minutes later with food, and in the other hand four crystal glasses and two bottles with dark red wine. 

Ten eyes Yangyang’s form in an attempt to restrain the boy. But when all four glasses are full and Yuta has also settled himself down—the only one actually in a chair—Yangyang eagerly digs into the meat. 

The conversation flows just like the wine. Yuta listens carefully to Yangyang as he describes the current situation in the village. He apologizes for not being able to send more but in these times, he and the giants he lives with would rather not take from the north what the people can’t miss. He tells them they can take as much as their boat can hold back with them though. 

As color comes back to their cheeks, Yuta carefully tries to feel out where Ten stands, what he remembers, and when he finds out it’s not very much asks what brings him here in the present. 

Which leads them to the explanation of their task. Yangyang said it was best to be upfront with the giants, as honest as they could be, and to include all the details they could. So Ten starts at the beginning. Meeting Doyoung, Hendery being taken away from him, riding east to Yangyang, sailing here with the question to bring them to The Widow’s Trail. He leaves out how he met Sicheng, just tells Yuta he took him with him because he trusts him and because Sicheng can handle the cold well. 

Yuta nods and listens with careful ears. He eats one bite and gives the rest of his plate to Yangyang, offering his untouched wine to Sicheng and Ten. When Ten is done talking, he sits back to take everything in, folding his hands into one another with consideration. 

“It would take half a day to reach the mountain at a solid pace,” Yuta states. 

“And to climb it?” Ten asks, trying to imagine the trail they’d have to walk. Would it be steep, full of rocks and rubble, or swept clean? Will there be footprints from the ones that walked it before him, footprints that do not walk back the other way? 

“I don’t know,” Yuta says. “I’ve never climbed it myself.” 

“Do people actually come to climb it?” Yangyang asks. 

Yuta nods. “The name they gave to it rings true. It’s mostly widows.” Yuta looks away then, his eyes pointing to where Ten assumes the mountain to be outside of these walls. “When the name was coined the people started coming.” 

“And not returning,” Sicheng guesses. 

Yuta’s saddened eyes turn even more distant. “Most of them have already made peace with it before they start on their trek to the top.” 

Ten looks at Yangyang, and then at Sicheng. He won’t ask it of them. He won’t ask them to come. He already asked them to sail with him to the north, to enter the castle of giants, he might ask them to accompany him to the foot of the mountain, but he won’t ask them to climb it with him. 

“Did you ever bring someone to the mountain?” Sicheng asks. 

Yuta’s gaze focuses back on them. “Yes,” he answers. “Just once. She didn’t return.” 

Ten sits across from him still on the carpet, his back to the fireplace Yuta lit so they wouldn’t be cold. His belly is full with wine and food Yuta provided. He has been nothing but kind to them, so it pains Ten to have to ask, but he knows he needs to, so he does. “Are you willing to do it again?” 

Yuta looks at him, his eyes piercing through Ten’s own. It would’ve been different if anyone else had asked, Ten knows this, but he also knows that the two of them have a history together. One that runs deep. He is reminded of the snark in Kun’s voice telling him Ten didn’t listen to his advice about staying away from the giants when he was younger either. Yuta’s answer doesn’t come as a surprise, not at all. 

“Yes,” Yuta says. “I am.” 

* * *

They leave the next day, even if Ten wants to stay and look around. He wants to explore the castle and see how much he can remember, walk the hallways and let Yuta talk until his ears bleed and his memories are back. 

Yuta had come up to him the night before, bending down so low he almost hit his head on the ground and squinting at him, proclaiming time and again that he couldn’t believe Ten had come. _Finally,_ Yuta had said, _you’re here._ He had promised Ten could come back once all of this was said and done. Had promised he would answer any question Ten had. 

But for now, there were more pressing matters. Ten might not have been right when he said the giants were the ones who talked the suns into it in the first place, but he _was_ right when he had guessed they were planning an uprising, taking advantage of the opportunity. 

“It won’t be long before the trolls will break out of the ice,” Yuta says as Ten sits on his shoulder, clutching Yuta’s red hair to keep from falling. They might have refused to pick a side in the war—instead putting themselves into a self induced sleep—but there is a high chance they will side with the giants once they see what is left of them. They taught the tongue of the dragons to them after all, they are closer to kin with the giants than with the gods. “Every minute they’re still under is a blessing.” 

They make quick time to the mountain, the landscape passing by Ten in a blur. Yuta rushes them not over the open expanse of white but through the mountain passes. When Ten looks up he can see the edges of the mountains become more jagged with ice and rocks and he can’t help but feel the doubt settle in. 

During their nights on the ship, Sicheng would often repeat Taeyong’s words to Ten, telling him it’s okay to be afraid, okay to be scared. That it’s a normal human emotion, and he is allowed to have it. 

It had been one of the only things Ten had brushed off. Scared didn’t get him across land and water and desert. It wouldn’t get him across snow. Being afraid would let his hands shake, and although he hadn’t lied to Doyoung in the desert, what if he missed. He reaches for his bow just so he can feel the tiger bone under his fingers. 

Hendery would let him sit in while he worked whenever and wherever, but not for the bow. Ten hadn’t even known he was making it until Hendery gave it to him on the twenty seventh day of the second month. 

He had been at the palace for three years already, it had only been a year since they had become friends. Hendery had handed him a bow under the notion of it being his birthday, and because neither of them actually knew when Ten’s birthday was, he had asked his father what day Ten was brought to the palace three years ago. They had celebrated it ever since, Ten making sure that he returned home when the date was soon to roll around simply because he didn’t want to spend it with anyone but Hendery, even if it meant he had to cross the entire country and burn through his entire savings to make it back on time. 

They did the same for Hendery’s birthday—one of the days Ten could actually willingly get him out of the house. They would walk down the meandering road at night, away from their house, until they reached a spot in the meadow open enough to lie down in and talk until the sun came up again. One year Jaehyun had been there, he had taken the fabric off of the back of the wagon so they could lie in it and look up from there instead of on the grass. 

Ten had asked one year if Hendery didn’t want more, and his response had been easy: _No. Because this is enough to make me happy, and it will be enough until I turn old and grey._

They arrive not at the foot of the mountain, but somewhere in the middle, the path Yuta chose giving them a clear advantage. He says he will stay around and wait when he puts Ten and the others down. 

Ten looks down the slope, over the edge, and immediately pulls back, Sicheng’s hand wrapping around his elbow. They probably wouldn’t make it down on their own, and following the mountain pass Yuta took would be like walking into their deaths willingly. 

Johnny had asked him to keep Yangyang safe, so Ten turns to him and says, “Yang, you’re staying here with Yuta.” 

“No way in fucking he—” 

“There is no time to argue,” Ten turns to Yuta, “he’s staying here.” 

“So I can sail across water with a serpent in it but walking up a mountain is too much.” 

Ten remembers the clatter of Yangyang’s knife when the water serpent had emerged out of the water, the shaky hands clutching his jacket. “If anything happens, run. Do not wait, just go back to the castle. If the other giants come, do not engage,” Ten tells Yuta. He turns to Yangyang. “If I am not back in a week, you will set sail again.” 

Yangyang opens his mouth to argue, loudly. Ten furrows his eyebrows in determination. “You will set sail,” he repeats. 

“We’ll find our way back,” Sicheng says, earnest. “I’ll do my best to get us back.” 

Ten turns to look at him, eyes wide. Yangyang’s mouth clamps shut. “Fine.” 

“Are you sure you want to come?” Ten asks Sicheng. 

Sicheng looks at him like he is the biggest idiot on not only earth, but also of what lies above and below it.

* * *

Ten calculated it would be about three days to climb, three days to descend, one day leeway. 

In reality it takes three hours. Three hours until the air changes from bone freezing to cold, and the path turns from a climb to just a steep walk. 

They’re walking shoulder to shoulder, bumping into each other every other step. Ten is on the inside, the closest to the mountain, per Sicheng’s instructions. 

The wind is thinner here but still a constant pressure has settled itself onto Ten’s ears. Almost like he is underwater, having swum too deep. 

The light reflecting from the suns on the white of the snow is so stark it’s almost blinding, it’s another reason for Ten to not look down. 

They walk in silence, Ten trying to keep his thoughts in the present. It reminds him of riding next to Sicheng through the woods, the plains, the meadows and the streets. It reminds him of the quiet that would settle after a story or a debate between them, a quiet during which Ten allowed himself to look around and take everything in. A quiet during which he would sometimes look to his left and let his eyes linger on the way Sicheng would take in the world around him, bent forward over his horse, his muscles relaxed and smile easy. A quiet during which Sicheng would sometimes already be looking at him when Ten would turn, unafraid of being caught staring. 

The road is well paved and easy to walk. When Ten looks behind him, he doesn’t see the footsteps his snowboots would certainly leave. 

His breath comes out in little clouds that seem to almost freeze midair. When there is nothing left to focus on, he watches his breathing. Counts them when his mind starts to drift. 

The Widows Trail is an extremely ironic name, Ten’s mind supplying him that it looks terribly like they’re walking down a snow covered aisle. 

However, it does not lead them to a pedestal, but to an open space. 

When Ten looks up, he can see that the sky has drawn nearer. Seemingly to loom just above his head. He wonders if, when the night comes again, he could just reach out with his hand here and pluck a star out of the dark. 

The suns are up there now, in the heaven above him, looking like they are stuck smack dab in the middle of the sky, falling right over the middle of the land. It was the first day of a new week when the first one rose, Mark, so Ten assumes in the row that they have formed he is the one all the way over on the right, making Jisung the one on the furthest left. 

You don’t call out to your prey before you shoot it, or alarm it in any way shape or form about your presence. Ten has scolded Yangyang on it enough to last the guy a lifetime. But still, standing here right now, it feels wrong to just start shooting. 

He takes his bow off of his shoulder slowly, ignoring the nerves stirring around in his stomach. “Should I call out to them?” Ten asks Sicheng. “Ask them to come down?” 

“I don’t think they’d listen to you. They ignored their fathers, I don’t think they’d listen to their essential halfbrother.” 

Ten pulls an arrow out of his quiver. He feels a hand grab his wrist before he can load it onto his bow. 

“Can you dig yourself into the snow?” Sicheng asks. He doesn’t have to explain, not with his eyes still holding some kind of hope. Maybe Doyoung didn’t succeed, nor Kun or the emperor, and Ten wouldn’t either. But maybe Sicheng could try and make them see reason. 

“Will hiding just my bow and arrows do as well? I would prefer not freezing to death.” 

Sicheng gives him a smile, a dimple appearing in his left cheek. “I’d heat you back up to life. But yeah, just dig them into the snow, I don’t want to make them anxious.” 

As Ten sits down on his hunches and pushes his hands into the snow to dig a shallow hole, Sicheng also crouching down to help, Ten is reminded of something Kun said. 

“It’s funny you’d say that,” Ten says. “Kun said I should let my body be burned when I die, he said it wouldn’t do any good for it to just be put into the ground.” 

Sicheng nods. “That makes sense, destroying you with how you were created is what I suppose he’s aiming for. I think your soul might not be able to pass if you don’t.” 

_Tern,_ he thinks and remembers dragging her body onto land, digging her a grave into the still wet meadow and placing down flowers when he was done. Standing vigil next to it until the rain cleared and the sun came through again, like the sky was done crying. 

Ten knows where he buried her, could mark it on a map blind. A spot between the city Haui Yi and the river by the same name. A field where camomiles sway easy in the breeze all year round. 

_Does she haunt your dreams,_ Doyoung had said, _because you didn’t bury her right._

Ten hadn’t allowed himself to start unraveling that particular statement yet, had saved that for later. Maybe when he saw Doyoung again, if he could muster up the guts to ask. But now he doesn’t have to anymore, the answer is right there, clear before him. He pushes it down. Now is not the time. 

“Tennie?” Sicheng asks, his hands on Ten’s own stilled ones, trying to push warmth into them. 

Ten shakes his head. “It’s okay. I just—” 

“Can’t catch a break,” Sicheng guesses. “Even now.” 

“Yeah,” Ten confirms. “Exactly that.” 

He grabs his bow and places it in the hole, shrugs the quiver from his back and puts it next to it. Together they sweep the snow back, covering the equipment up. Sicheng stamps on the heap of snow a couple of times to pack it together, kicks it to different sides to make it look more natural. 

“Ready?” Sicheng asks. 

Ten swallows and nods, eyes slipping into determination. Maybe they can end this without violence. He hopes so. 

It takes a while to draw their attention, the suns seeming to be entirely in their own world. They scream until their voices are hoarse, but once the suns do notice them, particularly Sicheng, they are eager to engage. 

No crows, Ten notices when Sicheng starts his spiel by asking them how they are. He does so in human tongue. It makes Ten wonder if Doyoung hates the dragon so much he refused to raise his children with their language. 

No crows, just them carrying themselves on their own. They don’t look exhausted at all. 

They keep eyeing Ten carefully as Sicheng talks about the waste they have laid on the land, the water drying up, the people dying. It doesn’t seem to affect them in the slightest. Sicheng doesn’t tell them that enough is enough, he doesn’t beg, he just asks when they will finally be satisfied. Will it be when the land is nothing but plain earth? When the flesh of the humans has completely dried up? When the trolls rise from their beds and start eating their parents whole? 

They laugh, shrill and high pitched and childlike. Lost in their joy, their rebellion, their youth. 

_But Sicheng you encouraged us!_ They say with excited voices. _You said go right ahead!_

They hadn’t needed much convincing at all, Sicheng had admitted. It feels like Ten’s bow just a few paces away from him is burning a hole into the snow, wanting to be used. 

Sicheng’s demeanour switches when they ignore him time and again, already becoming disinterested. “The next person that will try to get you down won’t be as patient,” he says. One of them yells he would like to see someone try, Ten thinks it’s the sixth one, but he isn’t sure. All of them stick so close together it almost feels like they are one, and like one organism, they turn away from him and Sicheng, laughing. 

The corners of Sicheng’s mouth are pulled down, his brows furrowed deeply. Ten can’t tell if it’s disappointment or anger. Maybe both. He can feel it in himself too, wants to yell at them to just listen. He looks at the land before him, and even from this high up he can see the wasted away trees, sagging into themselves like a cry for help, the barren plains, the scorched up flower fields and dried up rivers. 

“Go ahead,” Sicheng says. It’s all the encouragement Ten needs to drop to his knees and start digging towards his bow and arrows. 

Sicheng offers to hold his quiver with arrows but Ten refuses, he straps it to his back like always. Feels the tiger bone of his bow in his left hand. Right hand free to reach behind his back. This is how he hunts, and he has just spotted a new prey. He starts on the left.

Move in silence and don’t hesitate, that’s how Ten works. Even in the cold, it is no different from hunting in the woods around their cabin, from pointing a bow at a god in the middle of the sands, from shooting the eye out of a water serpent with nothing but miles of ocean around. 

The sun Jisung is down before it can shout. Chenle is next and this is the moment when the rest of them have been alerted, when they have figured out what is going on. They’ve noticed the little whizzing sounds of air and know something is wrong. But that’s okay, let them notice, let them panic. He nails Jaemin just as the sun turns back around to face Ten. 

The sun Mark on his far right comes closer, to engage, to mediate, to ask for forgiveness, Ten doesn’t know, and quite frankly he doesn’t care. The nerves have moved out of his stomach, flown up into the air with the crows that emerge from the burnt out suns. Ten doesn’t linger on them, let’s them escape from the confinements of the burning shells around them and fly east, back to the Fusang tree, where Doyoung will welcome them. 

It’s like blowing out a candle, letting the room slowly be engulfed by darkness. The sun Renjun comes at him with his teeth bared. Ten doesn’t miss. 

Faraway, he can hear the _thump thump thumping_ of footsteps, coming closer, drawing nearer. It does not sound like friendly company. Ten blocks it out, focuses on the light in his eyes, the ground under his feet, the feel of his right hand against his cheek and the sound as he lets the last arrow fly towards the sun Haechan. 

His thoughts are not here, not in Johnny’s tavern, not in the cabin he calls home, not in the desert looking up to eyes he has dubbed hell. His thoughts are nowhere, his head empty and quiet. So it takes a second longer than normal for him to realize that the sun Jeno is moving, and it's moving in the wrong direction, screaming at the last sun to run, to hide, before it erupts in flames like all its brothers, birthing a bird.

Ten’s body reacts before his mind, swinging his bow over his shoulder and grabbing Sicheng’s hand and running. As they go down the slope they walked up not half an hour ago, Ten’s thoughts catch up to him. It turns into a long string of curses in two languages, some falling out of his mouth as he and Sicheng rush down down down. The yellow light around them is falling away and being replaced by another, more whiter one, just enough for them to manoeuvre themselves ever more down. 

They hit the end part of the aisle and the trace is over and gone. Ten can feel every pointed rock press into his hand as he lets it run against the mountain on his right side, making sure not to let go, neither of the mountain nor of his other hand that’s still linked with Sicheng’s, it’s a long way down. 

Ten trips and falls over his own feet in all his haste. Landing face first into the snow, his hand being opened as it slices alone a stone. Sicheng pulls him back up to his feet. He pulls Ten back when he wants to start moving again. 

“Get on my back,” he says. It is not a question, it is an order. Ten, for once in his life, doesn’t argue. Just climbs on and holds his breath as Sicheng’s skin under him starts to transform into something else. 

It is colder than it has been in months, his hand is bleeding freely but the only thing Ten can do is marvel at how the scales look in the light of the moon. He runs his hand over them, surely leaving traces of blood, and thinks they might look like stars if you looked at them from a distance. 

When Sicheng takes off Ten grabs hold of them to not fall off. The air hisses around his ears as they fly down the mountain. And only now Ten can see the extent of the welcoming party for them at the foot of the mountain. Giants with red and golden hair, beards small and long, some even reaching the ground. Some wear helmets, some wear clothes interwoven with metals, some wear nothing at all. And between them, smaller creatures with long black hair that ends in curls. Their bodies are old and wrinkled and covered in pearls and emeralds, some woven into their ugly skin. They look at him with eyes that are almost not visible at all, eyes that do not seem present, but stuck in the past. 

Doyoung might have looked at him with eyes like hell, but he hadn’t scared Ten, not in the slightest. The trolls though, they make his skin crawl and make the hairs on his entire body stand up even straighter. 

Ten looks away. He knows that he might have just solved one crisis, but the next one has already started. 

They spot a form running through the dark and wait for it a couple of miles ahead, Sicheng changing back into his human form. 

“I need to go back,” is the first thing he says when he is standing in front of Ten. 

It’s so absurd, Ten almost thinks it was Sicheng who tripped and fell back on the mountain instead of him. 

“For what?” 

Sicheng fidgets impatiently. He looks behind him, as if he is looking out for someone that has snuck up on him. “The trolls,” Sicheng says, “I need to convince them not to fight.” 

Ten looks at Sicheng, at his still open coat and bare hands, his legs that want to keep on moving. 

“I need to, Ten. We have fought on the same side of a war before. My kin taught them how to speak. They will listen.” He says it so earnestly, with so much conviction, Ten just wants to believe him. 

When in doubt, go for the eyes. Sicheng’s look like they are lightning up, two embers shining in his eye sockets. “The suns didn’t listen, I know, but the giants will. The trolls will. They have to.” 

Ten can see in Sicheng’s eyes that he believes it, so he asks, “Will you come back?” 

It makes Sicheng pause for a second, take a step back and look at Ten. “This isn’t an excuse to flee.” 

“I know that.” Ten steps forward. “You didn’t answer the question.” 

“I made a promise,” Sicheng says, and also moves forward towards Ten, “a promise I intend to keep.” 

Ten kisses him then, quick and hurried, as in the distance he can hear the snow move, being flattened by big footsteps. 

When Ten draws away, Sicheng pulls him back in. “I won’t ask you to wait. You don’t deserve that, Tennie.” He shuts Ten up with a kiss when Ten looks like he wants to argue. “I will find my way back, but you don’t need to be there as a welcoming party when I do. You’re not obligated to, I won’t ask that of you.” 

“You’re not the only one that made a promise, Sicheng.” 

“You can break it, if you want, I won’t hold it against you.” 

“Go,” is all Ten says, urging Sicheng back north. He decides to take a page out of Hendery’s book at that moment, as Sicheng looks back at him in dragon form. “You have something to come back to here, Sicheng. It’s not much, just me and Minki, maybe, when she feels like it. But we’ll be here, roaming the land. We wouldn’t mind some extra company every once in a while.” 

Sicheng dips his head, turns his red eyes forward and flies, soaring to the creatures Ten just turned his back on. The scales do look like stars against the black of the night, Ten realizes as he watches Sicheng disappear. 

Ten turns his head heavenwards, up to where for the first time in months, the moon has come out to play. He gives it a wink, and waits for Yuta and Yangyang to find him. 


	7. Dawn Light

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dawn Light — when the sun rises up from the Bright Valley, bathes in the Pool of Xian, and rests in the Fusang Tree

There is something about the deep waters in the east that make Ten feel like he isn’t the hunter, but the hunted. The shimmer of the sun on them makes them appear safe, almost angelic. But underneath a calm surface always stirs something else. Ten doesn’t understand how his sister could spend half her time here, between the waves, and the other half close to the shore, calling men and women to a watery grave with her voice. At least she had a good voice, the same cannot be said of Yangyang, who is trying to sing along with Dejun as he steers and missing every other note. 

It had taken a lot to get him to come, and on the other hand not much at all. For all that he acts like he doesn’t care about rules, Yangyang doesn’t like breaking the ones Johnny sets. But he has heard Ten scream during the night, is the one that comes into his room with a glass of water to say that he’s doing it again. 

It only takes two to work Yangyang’s boat, but Dejun had already been on board with the plan before he had heard it, and who were Ten and Yangyang to deny him to come. 

It takes a full week for the sun Haechan to come out of hiding, being urged on by roosters calling out for it every morning. Another week for Ten to receive mail. Another letter. Another red seal imprinted with a bird. Another summoning, this time for a prize of honor and a ceremony in his name, promising him fame and immortality that will be given to him by the gods themselves. Ten does not want to live forever. He does not show up. 

They send another letter, but as soon as Ten sees the red seal he burns it. The third letter isn’t a letter but a bottle. Ten chucks it into the chest in his room, fine to let it rot away next to his arrows sharpened out of dragon tendons. 

The dreams start back up soon after. The same sky around him, the same sparkles of light, that same place that he can now name. The only difference is that his sister doesn’t scream, but the voice that has exchanged itself for Kun’s does. 

It boulders through his brain and doesn’t let him go. Keeps him captive in that place until the very last second every night. Ten tries to combat it by straying away from sleep, trying to hide from it. And he holds it out for as long as he can but every single time he tries there comes a moment where his body gives in, where he is sucked back into that place and can’t help but have to look into Doyoung’s eyes as he unleashes his fury upon Ten. 

It’s not even just about Jeno. No, Ten has learned that the crow forms of the suns—their souls—spend their days sitting in the Fusang tree, cawing and cawing and cawing. He thinks back to Doyoung telling him in the desert that he didn’t bury his sister right, and the laughter that came with that. It feels incredibly hypocritical now. But then again, it had taken Ten years to get to the point where he could give Tern rest, he imagines it might take even longer for Doyoung. 

No, Ten quickly learns it’s not the suns that Doyoung is angry about. It’s Sicheng. Who has disappeared without a trace after that night the moon finally rose. And for some reason Doyoung is convinced Ten knows to where. It’s not an unreasonable thought to have. After all, Ten was the last human to see him, but you’d think after nights and nights of telling Doyoung he simply doesn’t _know,_ the guy would get the hint. 

The same question arises every time Doyoung spits curses at him in that spot between time and space: if Ten did know, would he tell? Would he give Sicheng’s location in exchange for Hendery? For once in his life, Ten is glad he does not have to decide. 

Dejun has taken his Suona with him on the journey. It’s the same instrument he used to walk the streets with back in Lai Yi during those first months he and Ten spent there. While back in Lai Yi, people and animals alike stopped to listen, here there is only an audience of two. But Dejun doesn’t seem to mind. During the day he plays for them and Ten is thankful for it, and during the nights Dejun plays for the waves and what hides below them, for which Ten is evermore grateful. It’s not the same as Sicheng’s calm and steady voice whispering into his ear, or his arms around his waist, but it helps drown out his thoughts nonetheless. 

Even out here at sea his dreams do not let up, and most days it’s Yangyang that shakes him out of them when the sun rises. They spend the hours before Dejun wakes together on the top deck, sometimes playing games, most of the time looking ahead. Ten is not the only one that feels the unease in the air. Yangyang has not let the knife Sicheng gave him out of sight.

Ten doesn’t talk about him often, Sicheng. And when he does it’s in hushed whispers to Yangyang only. Dejun leaves him alone about the topic, and Ten is ever grateful for it. 

That he doesn’t talk about him doesn't mean he doesn’t think about him. It’s hard not to when the shimmer of the waves reminds Ten of Sicheng’s scales. When every time he says something stupid he finds himself waiting for the stilted hiss like laughter or the venomous comeback. It’s hard to forget Sicheng when Ten looks up to the stars at night and imagines him flying between them, looking down at the earth like Ten is looking up at what lies above. 

_I wouldn’t be stupid enough to hide on earth,_ Sicheng had said. When at night Doyoung comes for him, Ten pretends he is none the wiser. 

When only him and Yangyang return from the north he doesn’t talk about Sicheng either, and his silence is taken as a proclamation of death. Taeyong asks him if he wants to hold a funeral, light a candle or a fire or the entire empire. Ten says _no_ and leaves it at that. 

In the end, it is not Taeyong but Johnny that gets him back into a rhythm. One day he barges into Ten’s room and tells him he expects him downstairs and ready to work in five minutes. Ten knows what Johnny is trying to do, what he’s trying to offer him. Ten takes it with both hands. Instead of working in the tavern, though, Johnny sends him out into the town to help the people get a grip back on their own lives. 

He and Yangyang help the fishermen start their businesses back up, pushing their boats out of the harbor with them, giving them the nets Taeyong has stitched. When the florist of the village asks Ten to help her bring the flowers back to how they looked before, he goes with her, if only because he misses their singing. He volunteers first when the water well in the middle of the village needs to be refilled, grabs a shovel and starts to dig when someone needs help replanting their garden. And when there is no work to be done anymore for the day, he rides to the outskirts of the town with Minki, sometimes even beyond. Just to trail through the woods or the plains, watching how little by little nature puts herself back together like the humans. 

Ten makes sure he doesn’t stray too far away from Lai Yi, from his friends, from a place that welcomes him to stay. Tolerates him. 

Ten makes sure he doesn’t ride too far away from the east, because out there beyond the waves rests a small plot of land on which the Fusang tree stands, from behind which the sun rises every morning after being bathed by its father. A father that has something, or rather someone, Ten is not ready to so goodbye to yet. 

They sail for three weeks straight until Yangyang turns on him, telling Ten that what they’re doing isn’t working. 

Ten has continuously said that they were getting closer, almost there, surely, it would just take some more time. And Yangyang and Dejun have let him. Have let him stand at the front of the ship and tell them: surely, soon. 

And now Ten asks for more time again, _just a little longer,_ he tells Yangyang. 

He knows they crossed over into _something_ a while ago. The shimmer of the waves is dimmer here, the air tighter and the water more still, almost unmoving. But Ten doesn’t get the same feeling as in the desert when he looks at the horizon in front of him here on the waves. There isn't that same pull inviting him in. The horizon doesn’t come closer to them either, like it wants nothing to do with them at all. 

Yangyang gives it another week before he says, “We’re going back.” 

Ten pleads to go just a little longer, just a little further, just a tiny bit more. But Yangyang won’t have it, and whereas Dejun had backed him up before, the boy is quiet now, shaking his head when Ten asks for backup. 

“Enough is enough, Tennie, there’s nothing out here but water,” Dejun says. 

“You just say that because you’re a sceptic and a fool.” 

“No, Ten, I say that because there is literally nothing here.” 

Ten feels his anger flare up. His actual anger that has been hiding somewhere in his guts for a while now. 

“I don’t know where he is,” Ten says harshly. 

Dejun doesn’t step back from his tone, just says, “That’s okay, Ten. We tried.” 

“I don’t know where he is,” Ten yells. He pushes past a stammering Dejun towards the front of the boat. He looks straight ahead as he yells again, “I don’t know where he fucking is. He didn’t tell me.” 

“Ten—” Yangyang tries, but it’s in vain. 

“He left without telling me where to, you son of a bitch. The only thing I know is he won’t be found if he doesn’t want to be found. So leave your stupid fucking grudge behind, bury your children, and give me back my friend so I can do the same!" 

No answer comes. Just the waves hitting against the wood of the boat, the horizon staring back at him like it can’t hear him. 

“At least give me his body,” Ten pleads. “I just want to put him to rest.” 

Ten turns to Yangyang, but he’s already preparing to steer the boat around. 

“Wait!” Ten yells and heads below decks, dragging Dejun along with him. 

They return to the top deck with a body wrapped in a weighted veil, stitched together by Taeyong. 

“Ten,” Yangyang says immediately, “are you sure?” 

“Yes. Where better than here?” 

Dejun looks at him from the foot end of the body. “We could wait until we are back in the harbor, hold a ceremony there.” 

“She has waited long enough already. Here is fine.” 

He urges Dejun to maneuver the body closer to the edge of the boat, Yangyang jumping in to help too. 

“Certain?” Yangyang asks again. 

“Yes. On three.” 

On the third count they swing the body into the water with all their strength. The splash of water is loud, and Ten realizes they have been living in almost nothing but silence for days, Dejun even having stopped playing his instrument. 

They watch the body go under, the lead in the weavings making sure it will sink to the bottom of the ocean and stay there. 

Jaehyun is sceptic about it at first, but he feels pity for Ten—when he looks at him seeing not the loss of one but two people—so Jaehyun agrees to take him to where he needs to go.

Ten spends the trip not in the back of Jaehyun’s wagon between the piles of alcohol and supplies, but next to him on the cart. He doesn’t hide himself away. He knows what he has to do. 

They cross the Huai Yi river and ride further until they reach the city. Jaehyun’s confused look following Ten all the way to the woodmaker, where understanding dawns as Ten asks for a casket. 

_I thought you had buried her years ago,_ Jaehyun signs to him. 

“I did,” Ten says. Jaehyun doesn’t ask anymore questions, just helps load the casket into the wagon with Ten once it is built. 

The only reaction Jaehyun has once they dig up the body, buried a little north of the city under the biggest tree in the meadow, is a widening of his eyes. Ten has to give him some kind of credit for it.

Tern’s body is whole and clean, even the worms have left it untouched. When they clear away all the dirt and her scales are uncovered, Ten sees understanding dawn on Jaehyun’s face for the reason why Ten asked for a slightly larger than standard sized coffin.

As they dock, Ten can see Taeyong’s form waiting for them, wearing a nervous smile that drops completely when he sees only three people exit the boat. Ten realizes he can’t do it much longer. Stay here, play pretend, dance around his friends and himself. 

He falls asleep that night expecting Doyoung’s usual temper, that same hatred in his eyes. What he gets instead is something bordering on pity. Ten instantly decided he hates that look even more. 

“You once offered yourself for your friend,” Doyoung says. He holds up his hand before Ten can start to talk. “I won’t give you what you seek, you don’t deserve that quick a release. Instead you will accept the gift of immortality the palace was so eager to offer you. I will give you back your friend then, so you can watch him and everyone around you grow old and die while you live on forever in the space you chose to exist in instead of being with your real family.” 

Doyoung takes a breath, turns his chin up. “I’m glad you are not my son. I can stand hating you for the rest of my eternal life, but I could not have stood feeling the shame Kun feels every time he looks down at you.” 

“Him and Taeil aren’t embarrassed of me.” 

“Taeil wasn’t around long enough to form any sort of connection with you. And imagine what Kun felt when he heard his son did not instantly pick eternal life and to be reunited with his family, but would rather spend his life on this ugly planet until his death. You had the chance to come back and you didn’t take it. And now you will live with that. You might become immortal, Ten, but our gates are closed for you.” 

Doyoung doesn’t let him respond. He pulls himself out of time and space and back into the bright sky before Ten can answer him. It’s a back Ten does not mind seeing retreat. 

A body is found two days later by a fisherman on the furthest tip of the eastern land, washed up on the shore, covered in seaweed. The man expects it to be dead, but when he presses his fingers to the neck of the boy, he feels a pulse. 

He carries the body back to his village and sends his wife to fetch the local doctor. 

The absurdity of the first word the boy speaks when he regains consciousness travels through the entire east, everybody trying to have a guess at the puzzle. What would he need ten of? Why that much? 

When the news and the riddle reach the village Lai Yi, Johnny fires Ten, then fires Dejun and Taeyong even if they never worked for him. _Go,_ he tells them, _and don’t you dare come back without him._

Hendery stands paralized with his mouth open when Dejun barges through the door and calls him that, _Hendery._

It takes a second, but then Hendery breaks out into the wildest smile Ten has ever seen. “Has he gone mad?” Hendery asks Taeyong. 

He turns to Ten. “And you too. You’re an archer, where are your arrows, your bow?” He turns his head up to the heavens and sighs, looks at the woman that he is sitting with at the kitchen table and tells her, “I leave for a little while and suddenly everyone forgets how to act.” She cackles, trying to hide her face as she laughs but failing. 

Ten let’s Hendery scold him, secretly enjoying it, but he would never tell Hendery that.

* * *

The world starts itself back up, and so the humans in it do the same. 

After a while, Ten and Hendery head back west on Minki, a present from Dejun who says he will find a different horse to carry him south so he can get his stuff and then get the fuck out of there forever. 

Ten stays with Hendery long enough to spend his birthday together, and for the first time Ten tells someone the entire story, leaving nothing out. It flows out of him like the ocean and crashes into Hendery like a wave. As they’re lying on the grass that is slowly growing back, looking up at the stars, Ten tells Hendery about a dragon who hides between them. 

Hendery curls into him at one point, and Ten doesn’t say anything when he hears the quiet sobs. He just holds Hendery, close, determined to never let go. They wake up in the morning to the sun Haechan shining into their eyes. 

After his birthday, Hendery tells him to leave. He isn’t rude about it, just factual. 

“You’ve been told what to do so many times over the past few months, so let me give you the final order: leave.” 

“Hendery you’ve got to be fu—” 

“I am not going to keep you hostage in this stinky cabin that hasn’t been cleaned in gods know how long just because I had a little bit of a wild ride.”

Ten stares at him with wide eyes. “A little bit of a wild ride! Hendery that is the understatement of the century!” 

Hendery ends up banishing him. For a week. He sends Ten off and tells him he can come back any time after his banishment has been fulfilled. 

The week passes and Ten only comes back to drop Minki off and to tell Hendery to take good care of her. It isn’t that he isn’t grateful for Dejun’s gift, it’s just that he’s going somewhere where she won’t live long enough to make it back out alive. Hendery just shrugs, tells him he’ll feed her and that Ten better come back some time next year to show he hasn’t turned into a popsicle. 

Yuta welcomes him with open arms. He wraps Ten up in a long woolen coat, two scarves, three pairs of socks and lets him sit on his shoulder while he shows Ten the land. Let’s him relearn the tunnels and the passes and smiles brightly as Ten’s memory slowly comes back in his company. 

Over dinners where Yuta drinks plum sap and Ten scarves down meat they talk about the past. Sometimes just the two of them, and sometimes with the other giants that live in the castle who all have their own memories of Ten. Back from when he was immortal and he and his sister used to come here in secret. 

He has regained his immortality, but he has not regained his will to go back to where he came from. The gods may have banished him, and see it as a punishment, but Ten sees it as a blessing. He walked away from them once before, and he still stands by that decision. 

Tern doesn’t haunt his dreams anymore, and while it takes a long time to get adjusted to the emptiness she leaves behind, Ten is happy she has found her peace. Hopes maybe, one day, he will be lucky enough to see her again. 

In the quiet of the long winter nights, Ten asks Yuta if it’s possible. Yuta looks at him with eyes that go back eons, and tells Ten that when the end is there, when Ten is sure he has lived it all, he can ask again and Yuta will find him a way out of here. 

The months pass with ease. He returns to Hendery again around summer, Minki running to him and nosing happily into his hand like he had never left. They wait around for Dejun to hail his ass west and wait another day as the family from the east finally arrives with Jaehyun at the head, Aisha on his lap steering the horses. 

Together, they head south-east to the Ba tribes who welcome them with open arms, directing them to a stressed looking Jungwoo who seems to not have slept in days. 

“He just kept wanting to practice,” he bemoans to Ten and Hendery, “and naturally I needed to keep track of his times.” 

Johnny’s jaw drops open when he sees the sand lions sprint down the hills, but it is nothing compared to Dejun’s expression when he spots Yukhei, far and ahead of all of the other riders, probably about to beat his own record. Besides Ten, Jungwoo laughs so loudly people start to turn their heads in his direction. And Ten can’t help it, he bursts out into laughter as well, Dejun’s disbelieving expression is just too good to be true. 

* * *

The months turn over into years. 

Yangyang teaches him how to sail in a way that won’t let them crash into the rocks and slowly Ten starts to get used to the cling of salt in the air, the water underneath his feet, the sound of the waves. 

Hendery makes him new arrows, the leftover ones with dragon tendons stored away in a box inside their cabin, for emergency use only. 

As much as Ten has started to like the sea, he still feels easiest on land. He and Minki cover a lot of miles, ride through a lot of places, Ten’s quiver stuck to his back like second skin, his bow in his hand like an extension of his arm. 

He finds friends in the Barbarian tribes, has children throw snowballs at him and Minki when she finally convinces him to let her ride through some of the north, and shares dinner with the captain with the eyepatch who invites him to come with him on his next journey.

Ten stays away for a year at sea, getting acquainted with the crew and growing out a beard himself. He lets one of the men put a tattoo on his arm when they return. When he moves his arms in the moonlight, it looks silver, and during the day, it flashes gold. 

He rides through reformed meadows and villages, helping where he can. Rides back to the cabin when he has to, when he needs to feel that feeling in his stomach he only gets when he’s coming home.

Hendery stays in the west. He says it’s because it rains too much in the east for his taste. Ten knows it’s simply because he feels comfortable here, on his own, in his domain. Dejun comes around from time to time, spending some months in Hendery’s company and leaving again when they need some time apart to be alone. 

Ten spends his birthday with Hendery, sitting on the couch emerged in a book while Hendery tries (and fails) to cook them an elaborate dinner, but it’s okay, Ten eats the burnt meat, licks his plate clean, and says it was delicious. Hendery banishes him again for lying. Ten is en route the next day to the tattooist in the east to get a chest piece as a present to himself. 

He lets himself be led to bed by the man with the swirls coming out of his eye socket, rides to Lai Yi and tumbles into the sheets that Taeyong and Johnny now share. 

When he puts his pants back on the next morning, he pats his left pocket for the orange hoof scraper, and his right one for the promise. He decides to ride to Gaoyang to buy Minki a new brush. 

Ten crosses over the wide expanse of land, sometimes a destination in mind, sometimes letting Minki pick, but mostly letting the roads themselves decide. As he rides over mud, dust and stone, there are some moments where he lets himself linger, lets his brain escape from him a little while and allows his thoughts to drift to the way the red spots on the horizon remind him of Sicheng’s eyes. Lets himself imagine wings flapping next to him when a strong breeze hits his face. Lets himself think of the way Sicheng would say, _don’t draw that word out Tennie, you’re making up new things_ when he talks to Minki in dragon tongue.

Ten goes west, east, north and south and pretends he doesn’t imagine the presence of someone else there alongside him. He stays up at night and pretends in the morning that he didn’t dream of blinding scales. Ten looks up at the moon and pretends that the two red dots that sometimes flash are just an illusion. 

He keeps patting his right pocket every morning when he wakes up, carefully checking if what he promised is still there. And every morning he finds that he doesn’t want to break it. He doesn’t care if Sicheng has forgotten, what matters for Ten is that he hasn’t. 

It pays off one night years later, as Ten is walking through the flower fields in the dark because he can’t sleep, back in Lai Yi for the reopening of Johnny’s bar, now run by his two daughters.

It pays off one night when a couple of stars seem to fall from the sky, so close to earth looking like they will strike it. But when Ten runs to the chrysanthemums they land in, he finds red eyes staring back at him and a familiar voice telling him _you waited._

It pays off one night in the eighth month of the year, a day the bards will later sing about and call mid autumn festival. To Ten, it becomes one night a year where he has some extra company from evening till sunup. He does not ask for more, knows Sicheng cannot give it to him. So he just takes Sicheng’s hand into his own and thanks him for finding his way back, even if only for a little while. 

* * *

In the end, Hendery is not killed by a dragon or a god, but because one of his old and wrinkled hands slips and he accidentally stabs himself in the finger with one of the modified arrows he was working on. The ones containing a new kind of poison. 

Ten finds his body two months later, stark with purple veins and already half decayed. 

At the news of Hendery’s death, the grieving come from across the land, some riding sand lions and then horses, clad in windswept clothes against the sun. Some come from the other direction across the border on the south, wearing official clothing matching that of the regals from the palace that also come and pay their respects. There are civilians from the north riding down the land to the cabin because they feel like it's the least they can do, even if they have to be in the presence of creatures some have grown up learning to fear, and others have grown up not knowing of their existence at all. 

Two of the pallbearers come from the far south, but most of them come from the place where secrets are kept, where the land stretches further into the sea than anywhere else, where some sailors carry marks that only light up when the moon catches them. They come in a cart pulled by two horses, manned by one of their own, silence following their wake.

With their old and fragile bones, they carry the casket away from the cabin and through the grass, stopping at a place where the sun shines just right.

They bury the casket there, following Hendery’s wish that stated Ten could pick a good spot in the surroundings to bury his body. Only the pallbearers stay when the ceremony is done, and they stay for a while. Ten though, he stays the longest. 

He stands vigil over the place where the ground was just put back and stares. He doesn’t know how long he stands there, hands behind his back, eyes pointed to the ground, just knows when he finally leaves he bends down to the ground, and promises Hendery he won’t be far behind. 

He waits a couple more decades, until his friends and their children have all passed. Decades during which another war was fought, and Ten picked the side of Viet tribes over the Mao riders, riding with them to victory on a horse that wasn’t as good as Minki. Decades during which two new emperors came and went. Decades during which he wandered until he got sick of it. 

It is only when he knows he has been to every point on the map, every village and every city. Has seen the most of what the world has to offer him and there is nothing more he needs to explore, that he grabs the arrows made out of dragon tendons hidden in Hendery’s cabin, walks north one last time, and asks Yuta to press one of them through his chest and into his heart. 

Yuta stays with him as his eyes drop into the back of his head, holds his hand as his organs shut off and his bowels give out. Whispers into his ear to go easy. 

The giant carries him up a trail that funnily does not fit Ten at all. He had never married, never found the time to. 

Yuta buries him there in the snow, at the top of that mountain where the aisle leads to. A spot where the air is slightly thinner. 

He stays long enough to see a speck on the horizon come closer, even in the dark. Yuta thinks it might be a star, falling out of the sky and into another. But the closer it comes the more it looks like something he knows, or rather someone. 

Yuta stays long enough to make eye contact with the dragon, who then starts to dig into the snow with its claws. Yuta's body moves on its own to help. 

He stays long enough to see the snow be engulfed in flames, and then the body. It reeks, but Yuta does not cover his nose. He doesn't understand why, but it feels right, even if there is nothing to see or left but ash that gets carried away as the wings of the dragon move to make him return to the sky. He does not look back at Yuta as he disappears, just turns his back and flies. 

Yuta stays long enough until all the pieces of ash have flown away or sunken into the cold. It is only then that he stands and drags his feet through the snow, leaving his own trail in his wake. He is reminded of Ten trying to teach him how to track animals by their prints and him not listening, being too busy trying to be quiet to have a chance to look down and see more than just snow. 

Yuta walks through the snow and down the trail. He will not return until eons later, when he finally gets sick of the cold, and he will be buried with his helm in his arms on the top of that white hill. Where he will reach out with one hand into heaven, and feel another hand pull him up. 


End file.
